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ENGLISH  LITERATURE 


IN 


THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY 


THOMAS   SERGEANT  PERRY 


NEW    YORK 
HARPER    &    BROTHERS,    FRANKLIN    SQUARE 

A  r    r  .^         -J  Q  1883 

4  5  5  V       '  - 


Entered  according  to  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1883,  by 

HARPER  &  BROTHERS, 

In  the  Office  of  the  Librarian  of  Congress,  at  Washington. 

All  rights  reserved. 


'.'     '.  J?  1 


TO 

JOHN"  FISKE 

WHOSE   FRIENDSHIP   AND   EXAMPLE    HATE   CONTINUALLY   ENCOURAGED   ME 

I  AFFECTIONATELY  DEDICATE  THIS  BOOK 


2249G8 


PREFACE. 


This  volume  contains  the  substance  of  a  course  of 
lectures  delivered  in  Cambridge,  and  repeated  in  part 
in  Philadelphia,  during  the  winter  of  1881-82.  This 
statement  will,  it  is  hoped,  incline  the  reader  to  over- 
look the  direct  appeals  to  his  memory  and  attention, 
which  may  be  permissible  to  one  reading  aloud  to  a 
friendly  audience,  although  less  pardonable  in  the  for- 
mality of  print. 

In  preparing  this  book  for  the  press  I  have  endeavor- 
ed to  make  the  references  to  the  works  of  other  writers 
as  full  and  as  exact  as  possible,  but  I  would  once  more 
explicitly  acknowledge  my  indebtedness  to  Mr.  J.  A. 
Symonds,  whose  volumes  on  Italian  literature  have  been 
of  constant  service  ;  to  Mr.  Leslie  Stephen,  whose  "  His- 
tory  of  F^ngUsh  Thnn,o-]it  in  the  Eighteenth  Century  " 
is  a  thorough  exposition  of  many  subjects  barely  men- 
tioned by  me  ;  to  Mr.  Karl  Hillebrand's  profound  "  Ger- 
man Thouglit,"  and  to  Mr.  Alexandre  Beljame's  "  Le 
Pul)lic  et  les  Hommes  de  Lettres."  This  last-mentioned 
book  I  have  made  use  of  continually,  especially  in  the 
pages  on  the  periodicals  that  preceded  the  Taller^  on 
Pope,  and  on  Addison.  Mr.  Beljame's  thoroughness 
and  precision  make  his  volume  of  inestimable  value  to 


vi  Preface. 

the  student  of  the  first  half  of  the  last  centur}'',  and  I 
am  the  more  desirous  of  insisting  in  this  place  upon  my 
obligations  to  him  because  his  suggestiveness  is  so  mani- 
fold that  continual  reference  to  his  pages  would  have 
been  monotonous.  The  literary  histories  of  Hettuer, 
Eiedermann,  Julian  Schmidt,  and  Koberstein  have  been 
frequently  consulted,  and  seldom  in  vain. 

It  will  be  noticed  that  this  book  is  by  no  means  a 
complete  history  of  the  literature  of  the  last  century  : 
many  important  authoi's,  like  Prior  and  Smollett,  have 
but  a  word  given  them  ;  Fielding  receives  no  full  discus- 
sion ;  and  many  other  writers  are  not  even  mentioned. 
My  aim,  however,  has  been  rather  to  supplement  the 
histories  by  pointing  out,  so  far  as  I  could,  the  more 
evident  laws  that  govern  literature.  ( I  hayejiccordingly 
tried  to  show  the  principles  that  went  to  the  formation 
of  the  literature  of  the  last  century,  and  also  the  causes 
of  its  overthrow.  Many  will  doubtless  be  unwilling  to 
subscribe  to  the  belief  that  letters  are  controlled  by  laws. 
Mrs.  Oliphant,  a  writer  who  deserves  and  receives  the 
respect  of  all  her  many  readers,  afiirms,  in  her  admira- 
ble "  Literary  History  of  England  in  the  End  of  the 
Eighteenth  and  the  Beginning  of  the  Nineteenth  Cen- 
tury "  (i.  7  and  8),  that  "  every  singer  is  a  new  miracle — 
created  if  nothing  else  is  created — no  growth  developed 
out  of  precedent  poets,  but  something  sprung  from  an 
impulse  which  is  not  reducible  to  law."  If  this  state- 
ment is  correct,  literature  forms  a  singular  exception  to 
what  has  seemed  a  universal  rule.  When  we  consider 
Mrs.  Oliphant's  delightful  novels  we  find  them  occupy- 
ing a  normal  position  in  the  development  of  fiction, 
with  their  exact  drawing  of  life  and  avoidance  of  direct 


Preface.  vii 

moral  teaching.  Mrs.  Oliphant  acknowledges  the  exist- 
ence in  society  of  ^'  a  slow  progression,  which,  however 
faint,  however  deferred,  yet  gradually  goes  on,  leaving 
one  generation  always  a  trifle  better  than  that  which 
preceded  it,  with  some  scrap  of  new  possession,  some 
right  assured,  some  small  inheritance  gained.  From 
age  to  age  the  advance  may  be  small,  yet  it  is  appreci- 
able. .  .  .  New  modifications  and  conditions  arise,  the 
public  sense  is  awakened,  or  it  is  cultivated,  or  at  all 
events  it  is  changed.  .  .  .  The  reforms  from  which  we 
hoped  most,  the  advances  for  which  we  struggled  most 
strenuously,  do  not  produce  all  the  good  w^e  expected  ; 
but  we  cannot,  nor  would  we,  undo  them.  In  every- 
thing there  is  a  current  onward,  perhaps  downward,  but 
never  back.  .  .  .  The  principle  indeed  changes  from 
time  to  time.  It  comes  to  a  climax.  .  ,  .  All  is  not  ab- 
solute good  or  advantage  to  the  human  race ;  but  yet 
the  race  is  stepping  onward,  it  discovers  new  powers,  it 
learns  new  ameliorations,  and  if  it  also  makes  proof  of 
novel  sufferings  and  dangers,  it  finds  new  defences  and 
medicines  for  them.  ...  It  is  in  fact  a  real  progress 
through  a  thousand  drawbacks,  and  every  age  leaves 
some  foundation  upon  which  the  next  can  build."  This 
lucid  description  of  the  gradual  progress  of  society  might, 
it  seems  to  me,  apply  perfectly  to  literature,  but  this, 
and  its  application  to  art,  Mrs.  Oliphant  denies,  because 
we  have  not  advanced  upon  Shakspere,  Bacon,  Chaucer, 
and  Fra  Angelico.  This  is,  in  brief,  her  reason  for 
limiting  the  extent  to  which  law  may  be  affirmed  to 
exist.  According  to  her,  and  to  a  very  current  opinion 
which  she  represents,  literature  and  art  are  outside  of 
■  law. 


viii  Preface. 

Yet  if  we  are  unwilling  to  regard  art  and  literature 
as  miraculous,  may  we  not  be  justified  in  supposing  that 
there  is  some  confusion  in  thus  limiting  the  rules  that 
govern  the  human  mind  in  its  other  relations?  Does  it 
follow  from  the  proposition  that  literature  is  governed 
by  law  that  there  should  be  a  regular  gradation  of  gen- 
ius ?  that  Dryden's  plays  should  be  superior  to  Shak- 
spere's,  and  Dean  Milman's  to  both  ?  If  these  expecta- 
tions are  disappointed,  is  the  law  of  progress  at  fault  ? 
I  think  not.  Those  who  agree  with  Mi's.  Oliphant  in 
finding  progress  in  political  history  certainly  cannot 
find,  let  us  say,  in  the  arguments  uttered  a  few  j^ears 
ago  in  Congress  in  favor  of  what  was  called  the  Force 
Law,  an  advance  upon  the  position  that  was  taken  in 
Parliament,  nearly  two  and  a  half  centuries  ago,  against 
Charles  I. ;  yet  no  one  will  deny  the  general  advance 
in  personal  freedom  throughout  the  civilized  world 
since  that  day,  and  that  in  this  country  liberty  is 
not  a  mere  oratorical  catch-word.  The  great  literary 
glory  of  the  reign  of  Elizabeth  was  but  one  expres- 
sion of  the  same  fervor  that  inspired  Drake  and  Ra- 
leigh ;  and  in  our  own  time,  when  literature  appears 
to  languish,  Mrs.  Oliphant's  own  novels  are  express- 
ing the  same  wider  interest  in  the  people  that  in  poli- 
tics makes  itself  felt  as  the  spread  of  democracy. 
The  construction  of  an  arrears-of  -  rent  bill  is  less 
dramatic  than  was  the  attempt  to  arrest  the  five  mem- 
bers of  the  House  of  Commons,  just  as  Marlowe's  "Dr. 
Faustus"  is  more  thrilling  than  any  novel  of  the  realists, 
but  one  is  as  much  governed  by  law  as  the  other,  is 
equally  the  result  of  antecedent  causes.  To  ask  noth- 
ing but  heroics  of  literature  would  be  like  demanding  • 


Preface.  ix 

nothing  but  the  expression  of  devotion  in  painting. 
May  we  not  hope  that  the  jtresent  interest  in  reality 
and  distrust  of  literary  conventions  may  in  time  help 
the  production  of  masterpieces?  George  Eliot's  novels, 
for  example,  sliow  us  how  far  the  province  of  literature 
has  been  enlarged,  how  great  has  been  the  addition  to 
the  material  of  writers,  if  the  phrase  may  be  allowed, 
within  a  century.  There  is  no  need  of  fearing  that 
heroism  is  extinct,  and  it  is  not  impossible  that  litera- 
ture may  yet  flash  into  a  brilliancy  for  which  long  years 
spent  in  studying  real  life  shall  have  prepared  writers 
and  readers.  At  any  rate,  a  genius,  in  the  future  as  in 
the  past  and  the  present,  is  bound  by  the  necessity  of 
building  on  the  foundations  that  society  is  laying  every 
day.  Every  apparently  insignificant  action  of  ours  con- 
tributes its  mite  to  the  sum  of  circumstances  which  in- 
spire the  writer,  whose  vision  may  be  dim  or  inaccurate, 
but  who  can  see  only  what  exists  or  may  exist,  and  is 
limited  by  experience  whether  this  be  treated  literally 
or  be  modified  by  the  imagination.  I^o  writer  can  es- 
cape this  limitation  any  more  than  he  can  imagine  a 
sixth  sense.  If  these  statements  are  accurate,  and  a 
general,  although  not  uniform,  progress  is  acknowledged 
to  exist  in  society,  literature  maj^  also  be  said  to  be 
under  the  sway  of  law,  or,  rather,  to  move  in  accordance 
with  law.  We  shall  not  expect  every  later  writer  to  be 
greater  than  Shakspere,  any  more  than  we  shall  expect 
a  greater  enthusiasm  for  high  truths  in  the  birthplace 
of  Daisy  Miller  than  in  the  Athens  of  Pericles.  Yet  it 
may  well  be  that,  although  the  vivid  genius  is  absent, 
there  is  a  general  widening  of  human  interest  and  sym- 
pathies, which  will  be  more  apparent  when  it  is  crystal- 


X  Preface. 

lized  by  some  great  writer  than  it  is  now,  when,  as  Cot- 
tle sang  of  climbing  Malvern  Hills, 

"  It  needs  the  evidence  of  close  deduction 
To  know  that  ever  I  shall  reach  the  top." 

Before  closing,  I  wish  to  express  my  gratitude  to  the 
trustees  and  the  oiBcials  of  the  Boston  Public  Library 
for  their  unfailing  kindness. 

My  hearty  thanks  are  also  due  to  my  friend,  Mr. 
George  Pellew,  for  many  valuable  suggestions  and  for 
much  assistance  in  correcting  proofs. 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  I. 

I.  Statement  of  Subject.  —  Modern  Literature  Appears  to  Begin  with 
Time  of  Addison  and  Pope.  II.  Beginnings  of  Modern  English  Prose. 
— Hobbes's  "  Leviathan." — Burton's  "  Anatomy  of  Melancholy."— Mil- 
ton's Prose. — Change  appears  with  Dryden.  IIL  Definition  of  French 
Influence.  —  Predominance  of  Roman  Influence  in  Renaissance.  — 
French  Estimate  of  Homer  and  Vergil. — French  Classical  Literature. 
IV.  Metaphysical  Poets :  Cowley,  Donne,  Waller. — The  Couplet  Suc- 
ceeding the  Stanza. — Davenant's  "  Gondibert."  V.  The  Neglect  of 
Milton Page  1 

CHAPTER  II. 

I.  Number  of  Books  Printed  at  End  of  Seventeenth  Century. — Interest 
in  Classics  a  Hundred  Years  Earlier. — The  Civil  Wars  had  Injured  the 
Free  Growth  of  Letters. — Butler's  "  Hudibras." — Misery  of  Writers. 
II.  Satirical  Poetry. — George  Gascoigne's  "  Steele  Glas."  —  Joseph 
HaTlV^tTfes."— Butler,  [ill.  Dryden's  "  Absalom  and  AchitopheV 
and  "Medal." — His  Readers. — "ThVHind  and  the  Panther." — "Mac 
FTecIaioeT'^^— Dryd^eiTs  Modification  of  the  Poetical  Diction.  IV.  The 
New  Spirit  Demanding  New  Translations  of  Classics. — Chapman  and 
Pope.  V.  Dryden's  Versions  of  Chaucer. — His  Clearness  ;  Modern 
Obscurity.— Dryden's  "  Odes."— His  Faults 38 

CHAPTER    III. 

I.  French  Stage  as  a  Model  for  English  Writers.  II.  Prynne's  "  Histrio- 
Mastix." — The  Puritans  Close  the  Theatres.  III.  Theatres  After  the 
Restoration. — The  Heroic  Plays. — The  Heroic  Romances. — Pastoral 
Poetry. — The  Tales  of  Chivalry, — Scorn  of  Elizabethan  Drama. — 
Dryden's  Plays. — His  "State  of  Innocence." — Lee's  Plays. — Ot way's. 
IV.  Songs  of  the  Restoration.  V.  Collier's  Onslaught  on  the 
Stage Y8 


xii  Contents. 


CHAPTER   IV. 

Addison's  Early  Poems. — The  Current  Opinions  of  his  Day. — His 
"Blenheim,"  and  John  PhiUps's  Poem  on  the  Same  Subject.  IT.  Ad- 
dison's Comments  on  Gothic  Architecture. — The  Opinions  of  hisTTon^ 
tempoi'aTries.^^Addlsou  on  Mountain  Scenery. — His  Agreement  with 
the  Men  of  his  Generation.  III.  Condition  of  Society.  IV.  Steele's 
Liffi^^^Early  Periodicals. — Dunton's  Athenian  Gazette. — The  Tatler. 
— The  Spectator.  V.  The  Papers  on  Milton.  —  The  Authority  of 
Aristotle. — Addison  on  Ballads. — Influence  of  Addison's  Criticisms  in 
Germany ;  Gottsched,  Bodmer,  and  Breitinger. — Influence  on  English 
Novel.  —  Moral  Teaching  of  the  Spectator.  —  Imitations  of  the 
Spectator Page  130 


CHAPTER  V. 

The  Three  Unities.^-Conditions  Necessary  for  the  Drama. — Early  Italian 
Tragedy ;  Trissino. — The  Unities  in  France ;  Mairet. — Aristotle  on 
Tragedy. —  Corneille  on  the  Unities;  Voltaire;  Lessing. — Fall  of  the 
Unities. — Addison's  "  Cato." 182 


CHAPTER    YI. 

I.  Definition  of  Poetry. — Prosperous  Condition  of  Men  of  Letters. — The 
Change  in  Ministry  of  Sir  Robert  Walpole. — Steele;  Savage;  Swift. 
— Pope;  the  Position  of  Roman  Catholics. — Pope's  "Pastorals,"  and 
their  Predecessors. — Ambrose  Philips  ;  Gay.  II.  The  "  Essay  on  Criti- 
cism ;"  Roscommon's  "  Essay  on  Translated  Verse ;"  Sheffield's  "  Essay 
on  Poetry."  —  Didactic  Spirit  of  the  Period.  —  Pope's  "Windsor 
Forest." — The  Love  of  Nature. — The  "  Rape  of  the  Lock." — His 
Translation  of  Homer. — Relations  of  Men  of  Letters  to  Patrons ; 
Dedications.  III.  The  "  Dunciad."  —  Pope's  Virulence.  IV.  Free 
Thought  in  England. — Pope's  "  Essay  on  Man." — His  ^Satires  "  and 
"  Ep(sjtles." ~ . . . .'." ...7.. ". .   206 

CHAPTER  Vn. 

The  Mediaeval  Romances  and  Tales. — The  Picaresque  Novels. — The  "  Laza- 
rillo  de  Tormes." — "  Guzman  de  Alfaracho." — "Paul  the  Sharper." — 
"  The  English  Rogue." — Defoe's  Novels:  "  Robinson  Crusoe  ;"  "  Col- 
onel Jack."  —  Grimmelshausen's  "  Simplicissimus."  —  Richardson's 
"  Pamela." — Marivaux's  "  Marianne." 282 


Cuutents.  xiii 


CHAPTER   Vin. 

Parodies  of  the  Heroic  Plays  :  Fielding's  "  Tom  Thumb  "  and  Carey's 
"Chrononhotonthologos." — Lillo's  ''  George  Barnwell.." — Its  Influence 
in  France  :  Diderot. — Lessing. — The  Growth  of  Sensibility. — Rich- 
ardson's "  Sir  Charles  Grandison." — Fielding's  "  Joseph  Andrews." — 
Sterne.  II.  Appearance  of  Romanticism :  Walpole's  "  Castle  of 
Otranto."  III.  The  Poetry. — N{!W  Edition  of  Spenser. — Dr..Yoang's 
Poems.  —  Dr.  Blair.  —  Boyse.  IV.  Didactic  Poets:  Grainger,  Arm- 
strong, Dyer. —  Milton's  Influence  Denounced.  V.  Thomson's  "  Sea- 
sons." ^^^ITTTan  Ramsay's  "Gentle  Shepherd." — Gray's  "Elegy."-— ^ 
Love  of  MountaiuvScenery.- 


CHAPTER  IX.  . 

I.  Goldsmith's  Prose  and  Verse. — Conservative  Teachings  of  the  Critics. 
— V.  Knox  and  Dr.  Johnson. — The  Rambler. — Johnson's  "  Irene." 
— Boswell's  "  Life."  II.  Ossian.  III.  Chatterton's  Poems. — Percy's 
"  Reliques."  IV.  German  Literature  in  the  Eighteenth  Century : 
Canitz,  Besser. — Goethe's  "  Werther." — English  .Judgments  of  Ger- 
man Writers. — Coleridge. — Lamb. — The  Anii- Jacobin  Review.  V. 
Burns.  —  Cowper.  —  Thomson.  —  Goldsmith.  —  Wordsworth's  Early 
Poems.     VI.  Conclusion '. 396 

INDEX 443 


ENGLISH  LITERATURE 

IN 

THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY. 


CHAPTER  I. 

I.  Whatever  the  period  that  may  be  chosen  as  the 
starting-point  in  the  study  of  literature,  and  especially  of 
modern  literature,  it  is  necessary  to  go  back  to  find  out 
the  origin  of  the  theories  and  the  formulas  then  existing, 
to  see  what  influences  were  at  work,  and  to  learn  the 
general  current  of  the  thought  of  the  time.  Even  if  these 
lectures  began  with  Chaucer,  it  is  obvious  that  we  should 
have  to  study  Chaucer's  indebtedness  to  Italian  models 
and  to  mediaeval  literature  before  we  could  fully  compre- 
hend his  precise  position  ;  and  in  beginning  with  the 
writers  of  the  Restoration  period,  while  we  shall  have  to 
study  briefly  those  authors  who  went  before  as  well  as 
some  of  those  who  lived  in  other  countries,  we  have  as  a 
sort  of  excuse  for  choosing  this  as  a  starting-point  that 
with  these  writers  what  we  feel  to  be  modern  literature 
begins. 

Of  course,  this   is    not    a   scientific   division.      By   no 

stretch   of   language   can   Shakspere   or  Ben  Jonson  be 

numbered   among   ancient   authors :    all   that  I  mean  is 

1 


2  English  Literature. 

this,  that  Addison  and  Pope  are  the  first  writers  of  whom 
we  feel  that  they  are,  so  to  speak,  our  fellow-citizens  rather 
than  remote  beings  whom  we  admire  for  their  intellectual 
gifts.  As  Vernon  Lee  j)uts  it,  in  speaking  of  the  Italian 
Avriters  of  the  last  century  :  "  It  is  in  dealing  with  them 
that  we  first  find  that  w^e  have  to  do  no  longer  with  our 
remote  ancestors  living  in  castellated  houses,  travelling  on 
horseback,  fighting  in  the  streets,  and  carousing  at  ban- 
quets,but  with  the  grandfathers  of  our  grandfathers,  steady, 
formal,  hypocritical  people,  paying  visits  in  coaches,  going 
to  operas,  giving  dinner-parties,  and  litigating  and  slan- 
dering i-ather  than  assassinating  and  poisoning."  * 

This  feeling  is  due  to  many  causes.  The  fact  that  civ- 
ilization was  then  firmly  settled  gave  a  different  tone  to 
literature.  Earlier,  the  joyous  pride  in  the  possession  of 
national  life,  which  was  strongly  felt  in  the  time  of  Eliza- 
beth, on  account  of v  the  awakening  of  that  age  to  the  con- 
sciousness of  new  powers  ;  the  great  discoveries  in  phys- 
ical science  ;  the  opening  of  unknown  lands  ;  the  revela- 
tion of  the  beauties  of  classical  literature  ;  the  unaccus- 
tomed religious  freedom  —  all  these  things  inspired  the 
writers  of  what  we  call  the  Elizabethan  period-  Avith  a 
sort  of  primal  fire  and  energy  which  make  them  seem  re- 
mote from  our  cooler,  critical  days. 

They  appeared  even  more  remote  to  our  ancestors  at 
the  time  of  Queen  Anne.  Then  the  pride  of  national  life 
had  faded  into  political  rancor,  and  the  early  enthusiasm 
for  science  had  been  succeeded  by  a  period  of  patient  re- 
search and  examination  of  detail.  The  Royal  Society 
was  founded  in  1GG2,  and  it  had  formed  a  nucleus  for  the 
reception  and  dissemination  of  new  discoveries.  What 
liad  been  widespread  superstitions  gave  way  before  new 

*  "  Studies  of  the  Eighteenth  Century  in  Italy,"  p.  10. 


English  Liter  at  are.  3 

truths  :  astrology,  for  in.stauce,  lost  its  hold  on  the  teach- 
ers of  the  people  ;  witchcraft  ceased  to  be  believed  in. 
The  world  was  freed  from  a  dead  weight  of  idle  terrors. 
Bacon's  influence,  too,  helped  to  turn  the  current  of  men's 
thoughts  to  material  progress,  so  that  what  we  feel  to  be 
the  underlying  principles  of  modern  civilization  began  to 
be  lixed  towards  the  end  of  the  seventeenth  century.  Ad- 
miration for  intellectual  greatness  does  not  produce  this 
feeling  of  kinship  so  surely  as  does  agreement  in  looking 
at  practical  questions,  and  our  full  comprehension  of  the 
past,  and  our  consequent  sympathy  with  it,  begin  practi- 
cally with  the  generation  to  which  Dryden  belonged.  All 
l)efore_then  seems  tobelongjjo  th£  imagination  ;  he  and 
his  fontemporaries  appear  to  be  the_  first  to  fall  within^ 
the  ran<j,e  of  our  observation.  Then,  too,  not  oidy  is  the 
sequence  of  thought  unbroken  since  that  time — for,  it  must 
be  distinctly  borne  in  mind,  this  sequence  cannot  be  bro- 
ken— but  we  have  abundant  material  from  which  to  study 
its  advance  ;  and  the  whole  intellectual  life  of  the  present 
century  is  the  direct  outcome  of  what  was  hoped  or  feared, 
taught  or  denounced,  in  the  last  century.  It  is  time  that 
we  cease  to  repeat  one  of  its  faults,  and  learn  to  treat  our 
predecessors  with  the  respect  they  deserve. 

This  is  particularly  our  duty  now  when  we  boast  our 
ability  to  enjoy  all  varieties  of  literary  work,  when  we 
have  a  kind  word  for  every  man  who  has  any  claim  to 
greatness.  Of  one  thing  we  may  be  sure,  that  this  uni- 
versal taste  accompanies  meagre  performance  in  the  way 
of  creation.  Now,  for  instance,  when  the  English  drama 
is  entirely  a  thing  of  the  past,  the  taste  of  the  reading 
public  is  exceedingly  catholic  ;  but  if  at  the  present  time 
real  plays  were  written  which  interested  us,  our  feelings 
would  be  enlisted  in  behalf  of  any  older  dramatist  who 
seemed  to   support   our  theory  of  how  plays  should  be 


4  English  Literature, 

written,  and  against  those  who  did  not.  At  the  time  of 
the  Restoration,  Shakspere's  fame  had  greatly  diminish- 
ed ;  yet  there  was  considerable  interest  in  the  drama,  and 
the  qualities  that  were  most  admired  were  very  differ- 
ent from  those  of  the  Elizabethan  era  :  the  zeal  which 
animated  the  playwrights  after  1660,  their  eagerness  for 
correctness,  rendered  them  only  more  sensitive  to  what 
seemed  to  them  to  be  Shakspere's  roughness.  More- 
over, to  take  the  dramatic  literature  alone,  the  original 
native  vigor  had  gone  out,  giving  place,  as  we  shall  see 
more  at  length  hereafter,  to  a  form  of  dramatic  composi- 
tion which  substituted  a  very  artificial  mode  of  composi- 
tion for  the  wild  luxuriousness  of  the  great  play-writers. 
The  time  had  become  a  critical  one  :  people  had  begun  to 
study  methods  and  workmanship,  to  make  comparisons 
between  different  theories,  and  to  let  observation  replace 
inspiration.  This,  too,  is  another  point  of  resemblance  be- 
tween that  time  and  our  own. 

II.  Another  reason  why  this  period  seems  closely  con- 
nected with  the  present  is,  that  it  was  then  that  Eng- 
lish prose  began  to  be  written — a  prose  which  we  can 
understand  without  difficulty,  which,  except  that  it  is 
much  more  intelligible,  is  practically  the  prose  of  the  pres- 
ent day.  This  may  be  better  illustrated  by  a  few  ex- 
amples than  it  can  be  described  in  many  pages.  Thus,  to 
study  some  of  the  earlier  prose  *  in  Hobbes's  "  Leviathan  " 
(1651),  we  find  this  method  of  writing  (p.  170)  :  "And  as 
to  Rebellion  in  particular  against  Monarchy  ;  one  of  the 
most  frequent  causes  of  it,  is  the  Reading  of  the  books  of 
Policy,  and  Histories  of  the  ancient  Greeks,  and  Romans  ; 
from  which,  young  men,  and  all  others  that  are  unprovided 


*  Nathaiiael  Ingelo's  "  Bentivoglio  and  Urania,"  1650,  is  exceptionally 
well  written. 


English  Literature.  5 

of  the  Antidote  of  solid  Reason,  receiving  a  strong  and 
delightful  impression  of  the  great  exploits  of  war,  at- 
chieved  by  the  Conductors  of  their  Armies,  receive  withal 
a  pleasing  Idea  of  all  they  have  done  besides ;  and  imagine 
their  great  prosperity  not  to  have  proceeded  from  the 
emulation  of  particular  men,  but  from  the  vertue  of 
their  popular  form  of  government ;  not  considering  the 
frequent  Seditions,  and  Civil  wars,  produced  by  the  imper- 
fection of  their  Policy.  From  the  reading,  I  say,  of  such 
books,  men  have  undertaken  to  kill  their  Kings,  because 
the  Greek  and  Latin  writers,  in  their  books  and  discourses 
of  Policy,  make  it  lawful  and  laudable,  for  any  man  so  to 
do ;  provided  before  he  do  it,  he  call  him  Tyrant.  For 
they  say  not  Regicide,  that  is,  killing  of  a  king,  but  Ty- 
rannicide, that  is,  killing  of  a  Tyrant,  is  lawfull.  From 
the  same  books,  they  that  live  under  a  Monarch  conceive 
an  opinion,  that  the  Subjects  in  a  Popular  Common-wealth 
enjoy  Liberty;  but  that  in  a  Monarchy  they  are  all  slaves. 
I  say  they  that  live  under  a  Monarchy  conceive  such  an 
opinion  ;  not  they  that  live  under  a  Popular  Government: 
for  they  find  no  such  matter.  In  surame,  I  cannot  imagine 
how  anything  can  be  more  prejudicial  to  a  Monarchy, 
than  the  allowing  of  such  things  to  be  publiquely  read, 
without  present  applying  of  such  correctives  of  discreet 
Masters,  as  are  fit  to  take  away  their  Venome  :  Which 
Venome  I  will  not  doubt  to  compare  to  the  biting  of  a  mad 
Dog,  which  is  a  disease  the  Physicians  call  Hydrophobia, 
or  fear  of  Water.  For  as  he  that  is  so  bitten,  has  a  con- 
tinual torment  of'thirst,  and  yet  abhorreth  water  ;  and  is 
in  such  an  estate,  as  if  the  poyson  endeavoured  to  convert 
him  into  a  Dog :  So  when  a  Monarchy  is  once  bitten  to 
the  quick,  by  those  Democratical  writers,  that  continually 
snarle  at  that  estate  ;  it  wanteth  nothing  more  than  a 
strong  Monarch,  which  nevertheless,  out  of  a  certain  Ty- 


6  English  Literature. 

rannophohia,  or  fear  of  being  strongly  governed,  when 
they  have  him,  they  abhorre." 

Another  example  may  be  taken  from  Burton's  "  Anato- 
my of  Melancholy"  (1621)  :  "Chess-play  is  a  good  and 
witty  exercise  of  the  mind  for  some  kind  of  men,  and  fit 
for  such  melancholy,  Rhasis  holds,  as  are  idle,  and  have 
extravagant,  impertinsnt  thoughts,  or  troubled  with  cares, 
nothing  better  to  distract  their  mind,  and  alter  their  medi- 
tations :  invented  (some  say)  by  the  general  of  an  army  in 
a  famine,  to  keep  soldiers  from  mutiny  :  but  if  it  proceed 
from  overmuch  study,  in  such  a  case  it  may  do  more  harm 
than  good  ;  it  is  a  game  too  troublesome  for  some  men's 
brains,  too  full  of  anxiety,  all  out  as  bad  as  study  ;  besides 
it  is  a  testy,  choleric  game,  and  very  offensive  to  him  that 
loseth  the  mate.  William  the  Conqueror,  in  his  younger 
years,  playing  at  chess  with  a  Prince  of  France  (Dauphine 
was  not  annexed  to  that  crown  in  those  days),  losing  a 
mate,  knocked  the  chess-board  about  his  pate,  which  was 
a  cause  afterward  of  much  enmity  between  them." 

Perhaps  more  characteristic  is  this :  "  He  that  shall 
but  see  that  geometrical  tower  of  Garezenda  at  Bologna 
in  Italy,  the  steeple  and  clock  at  Strasburg,  will  admire 
the  effects  of  art,  or  that  engine  of  Archimedes,  to  remove 
the  earth  itself,  if  he  had  but  a  place  to  fasten  his  instru- 
ment :  Archimedis  Cochlea,  and  rare  devices  to  corrivate 
waters,  musical  instruments,  and  tri-sy liable  echoes,  again, 
again,  and  again  repeated,  with  myriads  of  such.  What 
vast  tomes  are  extant  in  law,  physic,  and  divinity,  for  prof- 
it, pleasure,  practice,  speculation,  in  verse  or  prose,  etc. ! 
their  names  alone  are  the  subject  of  whole  volumes,  we 
have  thousands  of  authors  of  all  sorts,  many  great  libra- 
ries full  well  furnished  like  so  many  dishes  of  meat,  served 
out  for  several  palates  ;  and  he  is  a  very  block  that  is 
affected  with  none  of  them." 


Enylish  Literature.  7 

There  is  no  need  of  many  such  instances  to  prove  the 
general  rule  tliat  English  prose  is  a  modern  acquirement. 
Even  Milton,  with  his  wonderful  ear  for  rhythm,  was  often 
as  clumsy  as  the  others  when  he  undertook  to  write  prose, 
which  was  the  work,  as  he  said,  of  his  left  hand.  For 
instance  ("  The  Reason  of  Church  Government  Urged 
Against  Prelaty,"  lib.  i.  chap,  i.)  :  "  To  come  within  the 
narrowness  of  Household  Government,  observation  will 
shew  us  many  deep  Counsellors  of  State  and  Judges  do 
demean  themselves  incorruptly  in  the  settled  course  of 
affairs,  and  many  worthy  Preachers  upright  in  their  Lives, 
powerful  in  their  Audience  ;  but  look  upon  either  of  these 
Men  where  they  are  left  to  their  own  disciplining  at  home, 
and  you  shall  soon  perceive,  for  all  their  single  knowledge 
and  uprightness,  how  deficient  they  are  in  the  regulating 
of  their  own  Family  ;  not  only  in  what  may  concern  the 
virtuous  and  decent  composure  of  their  minds  in  theii' 
several  places,  but  that  which  is  of  a  lower  and  easier  per- 
formance, the  right  possessing  of  the  outward  Vessel,  their 
Body,  in  Health  or  Sickness,  Rest  or  Labour,  Diet  or  Absti- 
nence, whereby  to  render  it  moi-e  pliant  to  the  Soul,  and  use- 
ful to  the  Common-wealth :  when  if  men  were  but  as  good 
to  discipline  themselves,  as  some  are  to  tutor  their  Horses 
and  Hawks,  it  could  not  be  so  gross  in  most  households." 

These  extracts  are  not  intended  to  throw  doubts  on 
Hobbes's  humor,  Burton's  learning,  or  Milton's  eloquence  ; 
and  I  pass  over  Bacon's  simplicity,  Hooker's  fine  harmo- 
nies, and  Jeremy  Taylor's  poetical  prose,  contenting  myself 
with  showing  that  before  the  Restoration  there  was  no 
practical,  every-day  prose.  Milton,  when,  as  he  said,  he 
wished  "  to  soar  a  little,"  had  a  magnificent  abundance  of 
Avords  at  his  command,  and  at  times  he  broke  out  into  a 
rich  poetical  prose.  But  when  he  had  to  write  some  plain 
description,  his  jjrose  lumbered  as  clumsily  as  a  heavy  cart 


8  English  Literature. 

over  rough  paving-stones.     The  same  man  who  could  write 

such  lines  as 

"  From  morn 
To  noon  he  fell,  from  noon  to  dewy  eve, 
A  summer's  day ;  and  with  the  setting  sun 
Dropt  from  the  zenith  like  a  falling  star," 

seemed  when  he  was  writing  prose  to  have  lost  all  knowl- 
edge of  syntax,  and  all  appreciation  of  the  balance  of  a 
sentence.  The  trouble_was^_that. the  writers  before  Dry- 
den  woukl  weigh  down  their  prose  with  numberless  paren- 
theses, side-remarks,  and  let  their  sentences  involve  them-  ^ 
selves  inextricably.  Only  when  their  prose  took  on  a 
poetical  form  could  they  command  it.  Of  Bunyan,  on 
the  other  hand,  who  knew  nothing  of  the  classicisms  which 
so  often  embarrassed  his  more  learned  contemporaries, 
but  who  was  the  master  of  a  true  colloquial  style,  I  shall 
speak  later.  That  this  awkward  form  of  writing  should 
have  lasted  long,  need  not  be  wondered  at.  In  the  first 
place,  there  was  no  great  reading  public  that  should  de- 
mand clearness.  Milton's  pamjjhlets  were  read  by  scholars 
who  probably  thought  that  in  reading  English  instead  of 
Latin  they  were  making  sufficient  sacrifice  to  indolence  ; 
and  the  practice  of  writing  awkward  Latin  made  them  tol- 
erant of  clumsy  English.  Then,  what  we  see  of  the  present 
condition  of  the  German  language  may  serve  to  show  us 
that  it  is  only  by  a  great  deal  of  attrition  that  a  simple 
style  is  produced.  We  never  open  a  German  book  with- 
out noticing  the  artificial  construction  and  shapeless  form 
of  the  German  sentence,  both  of  which  are  sure  to  dis- 
appear in  time  as  the  language  is  more  used.  If  we  read 
Plattdeutsch,  we  find  perfectly  simple  constructions  ;  and 
so,  in  the  books  that  were  read  by  the  populace  in  the 
middle  of  the  seventeenth  century,  we  find  a  style  which 
is  readily  intelligible  to  us  nowadays.     It  was*  pedantry 


Enylish  Literature.  9 

that  injured  the  English  style  then,  just  as  it  does  the  Ger- 
man now.  Howell's  "  Letters,"  to  be  sure  (1618-1650),  were 
written  in  an  easy,  graceful  manner  ;  but  then  he  not  only 
could  boast  that  he  was  able  to  j^ray  in  a  separate  language 
for  every  day  of  the  week  and  in  seven  on  Sunday,  but 
he  also  was  familiar  with  foreign  literatures,  and  doubtless 
copied  Balzac,  the  famous  letter-writer  who  had  really  noth- 
ing to  say,  and  so  devoted  himself  to  saying  that  very  well. 

What  produced  the  rhunge  in  writing  English  prose 
we  may  take  to  have  been,  as  Mr.  Saintsbury  has  said 
in  his  life  of  Dry  den,  in  the  "  English  Men  of  Letters " 
series,  "  the  influences  of  the  pulpit,  of  political  discussion, 
of  miscellaneous  writing — partly  fictitious,  partly  discur^^ 
give — and,  lastly,  of  literary  criticism."  All  of  these  things, 
we  may  notice,  were  different  varieties  of  the  one  great 
cause,  practice.  When  only  scholars  read,  the  theatre  sup- 
plied the  literary  pabulum  of  the  great  majority  of  the 
people  ;  the  Puritans  read  the  Bible,  and  but  little  else — 
and  the  "  Pilgrim's  Progress "  shows  how  the  populace 
had  made  the  phraseology  of  the  Bible  their  own  ;  but 
as  political  matters  became  of  more  general  interest,  the 
pamphlets  adapted  themselves  to  the  wants  of  readers. 

There  can,  too,  be  but  little  doubt  that  those  who  were 
accustomed  to  listening  rather  than  to  reading  acquired  a 
tolerance  for  spoken  words  which  those  who  are  mainly 
accustomed  to  reading  do  not  enjoy.  As  Dr.  Johnson 
said  when  he  snatched  the  book  from  some  one  who  began 
to  read  aloud  to  him,  we  can  read  much  more  easily  with 
our  eyes  than  with  our  ears  :  and  so  doubtless  we  have  lost 
to  some  extent  the  possibility  of  comprehending  at  once 
the  long  sentences  of  plays  which  our  ancestors  grasped 
at  once.  This  may  to  some  extent  ex])lain,  what  is  other- 
wise not  very  clear,  why  ignorant  audiences  enjoyed,  for 
instance,  Shakspere's  and  Ben  .Tonson's  plays,  which  we 

1* 


lo  Eiyjllsh  Literature. 

prefer  to  read  by  ourselves  ;  how  these  comparatively  igno- 
rant people  were  able  to  listen  intelligently  to  long  decla- 
mations.    This,  however,  is  but  a  digression. 

The  extent  to  which  theology  was  studied  we  can  hard- 
ly imagine  at  present  ;  and  the  hot  discussions  that  raged 
on  all  sorts  of  ecclesiastical  questions  were  far  from  having 
a  civilizing  effect  on  literature. 

III.  With  the  Restoration,  however,  there  came  new 
influences.  Questions  of  politics,  as  I  have^said,  presented 
themselves  for  settlement,  and  the  long-winded  style  soon 
ceased  to  find  readers. 

It  is  customary  to  explain  the  change  in  literature  by 
\  ascribing  the  various  modifications  to  what  is  called  the 
French  influence  which  entered  the  country  with  the  re- 
turn of  Charles  II.  There  is  a  great  deal  of  truth  in  the 
statement,  but  not  enough  to  give  a  complete  explanation 
of  the  striking  differences  between  the  literature  of  the 
Elizabethan  era  and  what  we  may  vaguely  call  that  of 
Queen  Anne.  And,  if  the  statement  were  precise,  it  would 
still  be  necessary  to  explain  what  is  meant  by  the  French 
influence.  Taken  vaguely,  the^  French  influence  in  litera- 
ture lay  in  the  direction  of  correctness,  especially  in  the 
_^vay_of  ^correctness  as  compared  with  the  work  of  rough, 
untutored  genius.  Yet  the  tendency  towards  precision  and 
the  observance  of  rules  was  more  widespread  than  might  be 
imagined  by  those  who  think  they  wholly  account  for  it 
by  calling  it  French.  We  may  ask,  meanwhile,  how  did 
the  French  happen  to  be  interested  in  it  ?  and,  also,  by 
whorn  were  their  rules  imposed  upon  the  English '? 
t-  We  are  all  familiar  with  the  enormous  influence  of  the 
Renaissance  on  modern  society.  The  light  came  fi"om  an- 
tiquity that  ex])elled  the  dull  gloom  of  the  dark  ages, 
and  the  world  seemed  young  again.  The  fall  of  Con- 
stantinople in  1458  sent  a  nuniboi-  of  Greeks  lo  seek  new 


EiigllsJi  Literature.  '  1 1 

homes  in  Europe,  where  they  should  be  secure  from  Mahom- 
etan tyranny.  Ah-eady,  too,  in  Italy  scholars  had  begun 
to  take  their  shattered  relations  to  the  past.  While  the 
rest  of  Europe  was  still  in  darkness,  more  than  a  glimmer- 
ing of  light  had  begun  to  dawn  in  that  peninsula.  There 
were  scholars  already  there  who  had  made  the  best  of 
such  advantages  as  they  had,  and  were  eager  for  more. 
The  invention  of  the  printing-press,  the  first  of  the  great 
mechanical  inventions,  in  1450,  suddenly  brought  copies  of 
the  ancient  authors  to  hungry  readers,  and  literature  began 
anew.  The  mediaeval  literature,  it  must  be  remembered, 
was  considerable  in  amount ;  but  it  had  grown  artificial 
and  unfruitful  when  these  finer  models  were  rediscovered. 
It  is  impossible  at  this  time  to  describe  the  growth  of  lit- 
erature in  the  different  countries  of  Europe.  There  is 
opportunity  for  the  mention  of  but  a  few  of  the  important 
facts  connected  with  the  way  in  which  literature  developed 
itself.  In  the  first  place,  we  should  bear  in  mind  the  ex- 
tent to  which  the  European  knowledge  of  antiquity  is,  in 
the  main,  a  knowledge  of  Rome,  and  of  Greece  through 
Rome.  Roman  literature  was  for  the  most  part  an  awk- 
ward copy  of  Greek  originals  :  its  early  native  develop- 
ment was  crowded  out  of  existence  by  the  superior  Hel- 
lenic culture.  The  rude  mythology  of  Latium  gave  way 
before  the  Greek  gods  and  goddesses  with  all  their  legen- 
dary history  ;  the  humbler  Latin  deities  surviving  only  in 
the  simple  faith  of  the  rustics.  The  Greek  arts  found  new 
patrons  in  Italy,  and  almost  all  Roman  literature  was  made 
to  follow  Greek  models.  Horace's  odes,  Terence's  inlays, 
Vergil's  free  use  of  Homer,  sufiiciently  illustrate  this.  Now, 
when  the  classical  literature  was  discovered  anew,  Greek 
and  Roman  writers  were  not  so  clearly  distinguished  as 
they  have  been  in  later  times.  They  were  classical  writers, 
and  that  was  enough. 


12  English  Literature. 

What  we  notice  in  modern  Europe  is  this,  that  it  was 
much  more  commonly  the  Roman  than  the  Grecian  writ- 
ers who  served  as  models.  Thus  the  modern  drama  of 
Italy,  France,  and  England  began  with  copying  Seneca  in 
tragedy,  and  Plautus  and  Terence  in  comedy.  The  pas- 
torals of  the  same  countries,  which  were  long  a  favorite 
method  of  writing,  were  imitations  of  Vergil  and  Calpur- 
nius  rather  than  of  the  Greek  originals,* 

In  a  hasty  sketch  of  the  work  of  centuries,  only  some- 
what general  statements  can  be  made  ;  and,  without  going 
into  further  particulars  or  noting  the  few  exceptions,  it 
may  be  enough  to  say  that  modern  literature  was  built  up 
on  a  tradition  of  a  tradition.  At  first,  the  ejBfect  of  the 
Renaissance  was  almost  entirely  a  stimulating  one.  The 
long-winded  romances,  the  dull  allegories,  the  artificial 
poetry  of  mediaeval  literature  were  driven  out — in  fact, 
they  were  already  dead,  as  was  mediaeval  art,f  and  in  their 
place  came  the  inspiring  forces  of  wit,  grace,  eloquence,  and 
taste.     In  remoter  countries,  as  Spain  and  England,  the  ef- 


*  Symonds,  "Renaissance  in  Italy,"  v.  132,  note,  says:  "Tlie  more  we 
study  Italian  literature  in  the  sixteenth  century,  the  more  we  are  com- 
pelled to  acknowledge  that  humanism  and  all  its  consequences  were  a  re- 
vival of  Latin  culture,  only  slightly  tinctured  with  the  simpler  and  purer 
influences  of  the  Greeks." 

Sidney  said  of  Gorboduc,  in  his  "  Defense  of  Poesy,"  that  it  was  "  full 
of  stately  speeches  and  well-sounding  phrases,  climbing  to  the  height  of 
Seneca  his  style,  and  as  full  of  notable  morality,  which  it  doth  most  de- 
lightfully teach  and  so  obtain  the  very  end  of  Poesy." 

Scaliger,  "  Poetices,"  vi.  6,  says:  "  Seneca  quem  nnllo  Grjecorum  majes- 
tate  inferiorem  existimo,  cultu  vero  ac  nitore  etiam  Euripidc  majorem.  In- 
ventiones  sane  illorum  sunt :  at  majestas  carniinis,  soims,  spiritus  ipsius." 

"  Malherbe  .  .  .  n'cstimoit  point  du  tout  les  Grecs.  .  .  .  Pour  les 
Latins,  ceux  qu'il  aimoit  le  plus  e'toit  Stace,  et,  apres  lui,  Se'neque  le  Tra- 
gique." — Racan,  "  Vie  de  Malherbe." 

t  Vide  Renan,  "  M61unges  d'llistoire  et  de  Voyages,"  p.  209  et  seq. 


English  Literature.  13 

feet  appeared  later,  but  it  came,  if  anything,  with  greater  re- 
sults than  in  France  and  Italy  ;  and,  with  the  new  learning, 
came  a  natural  desire  to  do  their  work  well  :  to  settle  the 
laws  which  were  to  rule  literary  production. 

It  will  always  be  found  that  a  period  of  great  creative 
fervor  is  followed  by  one  of  careful  workmanship.  The 
Elizabethan  drama  was  in  many  ways  devoid  of  art.  In 
Marlowe  there  are  magnificent  bits  of  exaggeration;  in 
Shakspere  there  are  false  notes  —  although  nowadays,  as 
was  the  case  in  Pope's  time,  reference  to  them  is  dan- 
gerous : 

"  One  tragic  sentence  if  I  dare  deride, 

How  will  our  fathers  rise  up  in  a  rage, 

And  swear  all  shame  is  lost  in  George's  age !" 

and  it  is  easy  to  see  how  the  same  quality  existed  in  the 
later  writers  until  we  come  to  Davenant,  in  whom,  as  we 
shall  see,  forced  fury  became  a  sort  of  parody  of  the  real- 
ly grand  style.  Even  in. Ben  Jonson  we  see  the  contrast 
of  artistic  workmanship  ;  and  his  cool  precision  found  many 
admirers  and  imitators. 

Then,  too,  with  the  complications  of  politics  and  the 
fervor  of  religious  dissensions,  the  theatre  became  the  re- 
sort of  courtiers  alone,  and  lost  its  authority  as  a  place  for 
the  expression  of  national  feeling.  With  the  rise  of  Puri- 
tanism English  life  was  severed  into  two  distinct  branches. 
One  clung  to  literature,  the  other  to  religion,  and  it  is  per- 
haps only  in  our  own  days  that  the  two  currents  are  again 
uniting. 

As  soon  as  literature  became  the  property  of  the  ruling 
classes,  it  of  course  lost  its  national  spirit  and  acquired 
a  sort  of  cosmopolitan  polish.  Nowhere  had  literature  be- 
come so  much  the  possession  of  the  aristocracy  as  in 
France,  where  the  court  was   the  sole  pati'on  of  literary 


14  English  Literature. 

fame.  What  it  was  there  in  the  seventeenth  century  may 
be  seen  in  Taine's  essay  on  Racine  ;  and  the  literature 
of  France  was  built  up  almost  entirely  on  that  of  Rome. 
The  French,  for  instance,  cared  very  little  for  Homer  un- 
til this  century,  as  may  be  readily  shown. 

In  the  revival  of  letters,  the  French  naturally  found  the 
acquisition  of  Latin  infinitely  easier  than  that  of  Greek,* 
and,  moreover,  Yergil's  fame  had  lived  throughout  the  dark 
ages — mainly,  to  be  sure,  from  the  poet's  reputation  as  a 
magician  ;  the  other  great  writers  were  almost  forgotten. 
In  the  sixteenth  century,  Julius  Ctesar  Scaliger,  in  his 
"Poetices,"  lib.  v.  (1561),  lavished  every  sort  of  praise 
on  Vergil,  and  had  no  good  words  for  Homer.  With  what 
judgment  he  did  this  may  be  gathered  from  the  way  in 
which  he  went  astray  in  some  of  his  comments.  In  the 
sixth  book  of  the  "^F^neid,"  667,  Vergil  placed  a  certain 
Musgeus  at  the  head  of  a  band  of  poets — a  Musa?us  whose 
name  alone  has  come  down  to  us.  Scaliger  f  imagined  that 
he  meant  the  author  of  "  Hero  and  Leander  "  | — the  poem 
which  was  paraphrased  rather  than  translated  by  Marlowe 
and  Chapman,  begun,  that  is,  by  Marlowe  and  finished  by 

*  As  to  the  way  in  wliieh  tlie  Catholic  (^inircli  threw  its  weiglit  on  the 
side  of  Latin  as  against  Greek  Hterature,  see  Nisard,  "  Littenituro  Fran- 
9aise,"  i.  481,  and  Mark  Pattison's  "  Casaubon,"  p.  113. 

f  This  was  the  general  opinion.  "When  Aldus  Manutius  conceived  his 
great  idea  of  issuing  Greek  literature  from  the  Venetian  press,  he  put 
forth  'Hero  and  Leander'  first  of  all  in  1498,  with  a  preface  that  ran  as 
follows :  '  I  was  desirous  that  Musa'us,  the  most  ancient  poet,  should 
form  a  prelude  to  Aristotle  and  the  other  sages  who  will  shortly  be  im- 
printed at  my  hands.'" — Symonds,  "  Greek  Poets,"  ii.  348  [Am.  ed.]. 

Sec  also  Waller's  poem,  "  On  the  King's  J]scape."  Addison,  SjKcfator, 
No.  62,  expresses  his  doubts  on  accoinit  of  the  conceits  in  the  poem. 
Criticism,  like  everything  else,  is  a  plant  of  slow  growth. 

X  About  ir)40  appeared  in  Spanish  Boscan's  blank-verso  translation  of 
"Hero  and  Leander;"  in  1541,  Marot's  French  version. 


English  Literature.  15 

Ch:i])maii,  and  published  among  Marlowe's  works.  Chap- 
man, too,  thought  that  the  original  poem  -was  by  the  older 
Musaeus,  as  we  see  by  the  last  line  : 

"  They  [Hero  and  Leander]  were  the  first  that  ever  poet  sung." 

The  Greek  poem  was  apparently  written  by  the  gram- 
marian Musa?us  in  the  fifth  century  of  the  Christian  era. 
Scaliger,  having  fallen  into  this  error,  went  on  to  prove 
that  the  author  of  the  "  Hero  and  Leander  "  was  in  every 
way  superior  to  Homer,  saying,  "  If  Mus»us  had  written 
what  Homer  wrote,  we  may  conclude  that  he  would  have 
done  much  better  :"  *  "  Arbitror  enim  si  Musseus  ea  quoe 
Homerus  scripsit,  scripsisset,  longe  melius  eum  scripturum 
judicemus." 

For  more  than  two  centuries  Scaliger's  opinion  of  the 
superiority  of  Vergil  remained  the  opinion  of  the  French 
nation.  There  v.ere,  to  be  sure,  men  who  knew  how  to 
admire  both  :  La  Fontaine,  Racine,  Boileau,  and  others  ; 
but,  in  general,  the  French  agreed  with  Voltaire  in  put- 
ting Homer  below  Tasso.f  Voltaire  said  ("  Essai  sur  les 
Moeurs,"  chap,  cxxi.)  :  "As  for  the  'Iliad,'  let  every 
reader  ask  himself  what  his  judgment  would  be  if  he 
were  to  read  that  poem  and  Tasso  for  the  first  time 
without  knowing  the  names  of  the  authors  or  when  the 
poems  were  written,  and  deciding  only  from  the  pleasure 

*"Poetices,"  V.  215  et  seq. :  "Musaei  hiatus  rari,  et  leetis  utitur  verbis." 

See  further  de  Homero  et  Vergilio :  ''  Loquax  Achilles  in  concione  minas 
perfert  deteriores,  flet  etiam  apud  matrom,  atque  hie  est,  a  quo  virum  fortis- 
siraum  Hectorem  interfectum  crcdi  vult?  Nihil  putidius  Hectoris  morte." 
"  Homeri  epitheta  sa?pfe  frigida,  aut  puerilia,  aut  locis  inepta." 

Ronsard  seems  to  have  been  one  of  the  earliest  of  Greek-reading  French- 
men.    One  of  his  sonneis  begins, 

"  Je  veux  lire  en  trois  jours  I'lliade  d'llomere, 
Et  pour  ce,  Corydon,  ferme  bien  Fhuis  sur  moi." 

t  Vide  Sainte-Beuve,  "  Causeries  du  Lundi,"  xii.  ^8  et  seq. 


1 6  Engliish  Literature. 

that  each  gave  him.  Would  he  not  in  every  respect  give 
the  preference  to  Tasso  ?  Would  he  not  find  in  the  Italian 
poet  more  control,  interest,  variety,  precision,  grace,  and 
that  delicacy  which  sets  off  the  sublime  ?  In  a  few  centu- 
ries all  comparison  between  them  will  be  impossible." 

Need  we  wonder  that  Goethe  said  ("  Eckermann,"  Feb. 
24, 1830)  :  "  It  took  the  French  some  time  to  appreciate  the 
great  merit  of  Homer  :  there  was  required  for  this  noth- 
ing less  than  a  complete  revolution  in  their  civilization  "  ? 

The  French  in  the  age  of  Louis  XIV.  had  acquired  a 
civilization  that  was  in  many  ways  superior  to  that  of  all 
the  rest  of  Europe,  and,  while  England  was  led  to  follow 
the  literary  methods  of  France  by  causes  that  were  entire- 
ly national,  the  great  reputation  of  the  Augustan  age  of 
French  literature  naturally  inspired  imitation.  And,  to 
repeat,  French  literature,  like  that  of  Italy,  was  especially 
a  copy  of  the  Roman  literature,  which,  as  I  have  said,  was 
itself  a  copy  of  that  of  Greece,  Just  as  a  light  that  is  re- 
flected into  a  dark  corner  by  a  series  of  mirrors  loses  some- 
thing with  every  additional  mirror,*  so  did  the  inspiration 
of  Greek  literature,  through  Rome  and  France,  shine  with 
feeble  glow  in  what  is  sometimes  called  the  Augustan  age 
of  English  letters.  Greek  literature  was  original ;  and 
what  is  best  in  all  literature  is  the  most  natural  form  of 
expression — a  form  that  grows  from  the  soil.  We  shall  see 
later  how  the  revival  of  the  natural  forces  in  English 
and  French,  and  their  appearance  in  German  literature, 
(^  coincided  with  renewed  study  of  the  Greek. 

This  digression,  however,  must  not  make  us  lose  sight 
of  the  question  now  before  us,  which  is  the  amount  and 


*  Dr.  Johnson  said  ("Boswell,"  vii.  188:  April  29,  1778):  "Modern 
writers  are  the  moons  of  literature  ;  they  shine  with  reflected  light — with 
liprlit  borrowed  from  the  ancients." 


Enylinh  Literature.  17 

nature  of  the  French  influence.  We  are  always  too  ready 
to  think  that  we  have  explained  a  difficulty  if  we  are  able 
to  give  it  a  name,  and  in  the  present  case  the  explanation 
of  the  change  in  English  literature  might  be  left  where  it 
is  without  further  discussion.  Yet  a  more  careful  exam- 
ination will  make  it  clear  that  the  subject,  which  is  obscure 
at  the  best,  needs  more  light.  Fully  to  understand  the 
relation  of  the  writers  of  this  period  to  their  predecessors 
and  to  their  foreign  rivals,  we  must  bear  in  mind  the  com- 
plex sequences  of  the  Renaissance.  When  all  the  majesty 
of  antiquity  broke  upon  Europe,  there  seemed  to  be  but 
one  feeling  possible  :  that  of  unrestrained  admiration  be- 
fore its  great  glory.  Writers — and  the  writers  do  but 
represent  the  reading  public — fairly  prostrated  themselves 
before  the  past.  They  turned  away  from  their  own  lit- 
erature to  welcome  the  newly  discovered  one.  The  first 
thing  to  be  done  was  to  study  the  writings  of  Greece  and 
Rome,  and  everywhere,  in  Italy,  in  France,  in  England,  we 
find  the  eflPort  was  made  to  remodel  the  vernacular  after 
the  classic  languages.  Boccaccio,  Mr.  Symonds  tells  us, 
"  sought  to  give  the  fulness  and  sonority  of  Latin  to  the 
periods  of  Italian  prose.  He  had  the  Ciceronian  cadence 
and  the  labyrinthine  sentences  of  Livy  in  view."  *  And 
Boccaccio's  prose  became  the  model  copied  by  later  writ- 
ers when  it  was  finally  settled  that  Latin  was  not  to  be 
the  literary  language  of  Italy. 

In  France  we  find  Ronsard  complaining  of  the  meagre- 
ness  of  his  native  tongue,  while  at  the  same  time  he  de- 
nounces those  who  avoided  the  difliculty  by  writing  in 
Latin.  He,  too,  was  abused  for  introducing  classicisms 
into  the  French  language.  Yet  how  could  he  rest  sat- 
isfied   with    the    comparatively   meagre   vocabulary   and 

*  "Renaissance  in  Italy,"  iv.  133 ;  v.  246  et  seq. 


7 


1 8  ErKjlish  Literature. 

homely  construction  of  his  time  when  he  turned  his  atten- 
tion to  the  imitations  of  the  classics  ?  These  strangers 
demanded  more  ceremony.  They  were  translated  freely 
into  the  leading  modern  languages.  Sebilet,  in  his  "  Poe- 
tique"  (1548),  says  :  "Pourtant  t'avertis-je  que  la  version 
ou  traduction  est  aujouixriiui  le  plus  frequent  et  mieux 
rt5U  des  estime's  poetes  et  des  doctes  lecteurs."*  In  the 
same  year  Sebilet  published  a  metrical  translation  of  the 
"  Iphigenia  in  Aulis "  of  Euripides,  In  1549  also  ap- 
peared DuJ3ella^^'s  "  Defense  et  Illustration  de  la  Langue 
Frangoise."  He  urged  very  strongly  the  intelligent  imi- 
tation of  the  ancients,  with  a  just  criticism  of  translation, 
saying  that  Demosthenes,  Homer,  Cicero,  and  Vergil  do 
not  sound  so  well  in  French  as  in  their  original  tongue. 
In  a  translation,  "  il  vous  semblera  passer  de  I'ardente 
montagne  d'^tne  sur  le  froid  sommet  de  Caucase,  Et 
ce  que  je  dy  des  langues  latine  et  grecque  se  doit  reci- 
proquement  dire  de  tous  les  vulgaires,"  What  he  urged 
was  the  intelligent  imitation  of  Greek  and  Latin,  not  mere 
slavish  copying,  Baif  translated  from  the  Greek;  and  in 
this  little  band  we  find  the  most  enthusiastic  welcome 
given  to  the  Renaissance. 

In  England  there  was  very  similar  enthusiasm.  Gas- 
coigne's  translation,  through  the  Italian,  of  the  "  Jocasta" 
of  Euripides  (1566),  is  a  familiar  instance,  and  we  see  the 
same  Gneco-Latin  revival  that  found  its  French  equiva- 
lent in  the  ardor  of  the  Pleiad.  In  England  and  Spain 
there  was  for  a  time  a  sort  of  compromise  :  to  take  the 
former  country  alone,  Shakspere  stands  at  the  ji;nction 
of  two  great  streams  which  may  represent  respectively 
the  Middle  Ages  and  classical  antiquity.  In  France  the 
wars  of  the  League  interrupted  the  normal  growth  of  lite- 

*  Quoted  in  Egger's  "  L'llellenisme  en  France,"  i.  2G0. 


English  Literature.  19 

rature,  and  when  peace  again  prevailed  it  was  the  new,  arid 
correctness  of  Malherbe  that  defined  the  narrow  channels 
in  which  French  literature  was  to  run  for  two  centuries. 
Malherbe  met  with  fierce  opposition :  Mademoiselle  de 
Gournay,  for  instance,  Montaigne's  adopted  daughter,  ex- 
posed his  incompleteness  ;  but  the  times  were  favorable, 
and  his  commonplace  aversion  to  extravagance,  whether 
mediaeval  or  in  imitation  of  the  classics,  won  the  day. 
After  all,  the  classicism  of  the  Pleiad  could  scarcely  hope 
to  live  :  it  was  as  remote  from  the  popular  affection  as 
was  the  wearing  of  togas  or  the  observance  of  the  Pana- 
thenaic  festival.  Then,  too,  Malherbe  touched  the  chord 
of  patriotism,  and  in  denouncing  mediaevalism  he  struck 
what  was  to  be  the  prevailing  note  of  European  civiliza- 
tion for  a  long  time.  The  nation  that  did  that  most  effec- 
tually was  sure  to  take  the  lead.  France  did  this  by  being 
the  first  country  to  give  to  the  world  a  new  literature, 
whiclTwas  distinctly  neither  mediaeval  nor  a  mere  tracing 
over  of  the  classics.  It  stepped,  almost  at  one  stride,  from 
the  Grceco-Latin  period  to  its  own  version  of  classicism, 
while  in  England  we  see  two  very  decided  movements 
floui'ishing  side  by  side,  both  of  which  finally  succumbed 
before  the  French  influence.  The  most  important  of  these 
was  the  dramatic,  which  need  not  be  described  here,  with 
its  close  relation  to  the  popular  life  ;  the  other,  the  toneJ 
of  the  court,  with  its  pedantic  imitation  of  Italian  poetry.  V 
With  the  first  study  of  the  classics  came  the  attempt  to 
employ  classical  constructions,  while  euphuism  was  an 
effort  to  develop  the  language  in  a  modern  fashion.  Lyly, 
as  has  been  clearly  shown  in  an  admirable  paper  by  Mr. 
Friedrich  Landmann,*   imitated  an   old   Spanish  writer, 

*  "  Dei-  Euphuisnius,  seiii  Wesen,  seine  Quelle,  seine  Geschichte."  Gies- 
sen :  1881;  and  "New  Shakspere  Society's  Transactions,"  1880-2,  No. 
XIII.  p.  241. 


20  iLnylinh  Literature. 

Guevara,  who  may  be  called  the  founder  of  what  is  known 
as  Euphuism,*  The  general  groping  for  new  light  intro- 
duced a  thousand  other  affectations.  Sidney's  "Arcadia," 
for  example,  abounds  in  imitations  of  the  Spanish  pastoral 
romances  ;  and  perhaps  even  more  marked  was  the  influ- 
ence of  Sylvester's  translation  of  "  Du  Bartas,"  1598. 
Dryden,  it  will  be  remembered,  wrote,  in  his  dedication  of 
the  "Spanish  Friar,"  1691:  "I  thought  inimitable  Spen- 
ser a  mean  poet  in  comparison  of  Sylvester's  '  Du  Bartas,' 
and  was  rapt  into  an  ecstasy  when  I  read  these  lines  : 

'  Now  when  the  winter's  keener  breath  began 
To  crystallize  the  Baltic  ocean, 
To  glaze  the  lakes,  to  bridle  up  the  floods, 
And  periwig  with  snow  f  the  baldpate  woods.' 

I  am  much  deceived  if  this  be  not  abominable  fustian." 
Yet  Dryden  was  not  the  only  one  who  admired  this  abom- 
inable fustian.     Space  is  lacking  for  a  description  of  all 


*  It  is  interesting  to  observe  that  euphuism  still  makes  an  occasional 
appearance  in  English  prose,  as  alliteration  does  in  English  verse,  and 
abundant  instances  of  both  are  to  be  found  in  the  writings  of  Swinburne. 
Lyly,  for  instance,  wrote  many  such  sentences  as  this :  "  Gentleman,  as 
you  may  suspect  me  of  idlenesse  in  giving  eare  to  your  talke,  so  may  you 
convince  me  of  lightnesse  in  answering  such  toyes :  certes,  as  you  have 
made  mine  eares  glow  at  the  rehearsall  of  your  love,  so  have  you  galled  my 
heart  with  the  remembraunce  of  your  folly."  Swinburne  says :  "  The  buoy- 
ant beauty  of  surrounding  verse,  the  '  innumerable  laughter ' ;  the  profound 
murmur  of  its  many  measures,  the  fervent  flow  of  stanzas  now  like  the 
ripples  and  now  like  the  gulfs  of  the  sea,"  etc.  ("Essays,"  p.  255).  Lyly 
might  have  written  this  line :  "  Neither  by  defect  of  form  nor  by  any  de- 
fault of  force"  (ib.  p.  108). 

For  conceits  outdoing  even  Lyly,  sec  Pater,  "  Studies  in  the  History  of 
the  Renaissance,"  passim. 

f  Sylvester  says  "  wool."  Cf.  this  phrase  of  Du  Bartas,  "  monts  enfa- 
rines  d'une  neige  eternelle."  But  see  Sainte-Beuve,  "Poe'iie  du  XVI. 
Sifecle,"  p.  68. 


English  Literature.  21 

the  affectations  of  the  writers  at  the  time  of  Elizabeth. 
Gongorism  in  Spain,  and  Marinism  in  Italy,  show  how 
widespread  was  the  confusion  which  the  new  cultivation 
wrought  in  the  language.  Can  we  be  surprised  that  Mal- 
herbe  carried  the  reaction  against  conceits  as  far  as  he  did, 
when  we  read  such  passages  as  these  from  "  Du  Bartas"? 
The  world,  he  tells  us,  would  have  remained  in  a  state  of 
confusion,  if  the  divine  Word 

"  N'eut  conime  siringue  dedans  ces  membres  morts 
Je  ne  sais  quel  esprit  qui  nieut  tout  ce  grand  corps." 

or  this,  expressive  of  a  galloping  horse  ? 

"  Le  champ  plat  bat,  abat,  detrappe,  grappe,  attrappe 
Le  vent  qui  va  devant — " 

Other  examples  of  his  lawlessness  may  be  found  :  "II 
gagne  du  dauphin  la  ba-branlante  echine;"  "  Sur  pe-petil- 
lant;"  "La  peur,  a,  qui  ba-bat  incessamment  la  flanc." 
These  may  be  compared  with  such  gems  as  the  following 
in  English  from  A.  Fraunce's  translation  of  Tasso's  "  Lam- 
entations of  Amyntas,"  1587  : 

"  rie  quench  theyr  thirst  by  my  hartbloud, 
Blynde  boy's,  proud  gyrle's  thirst :  and  glut  their  eyes  with  aboundant 
Streams  of  purpled  gore  of  tootoo  wretched  Amyntas." 

Malherbe  killed  these  affectations  with  one  blow  ;  in 
England  they  died  a  lingering  death.  In  France,  Mal- 
herbe was  folloAved  by  Corneille,  Racine,  and  Boileau,  who 
flourished  under  a  strong  government  that  embodied  the 
most  complete  reaction  against  extravagance  of  every  sort. 
License  in  literature  was  as  impossible  as  political  free-  [ 
dom,  and  the  completeness  with  which  France  adopted  • 
the  idea  of  sujjmission  to  authority  made  its  brilliant  civ- 
,JIization  the  model  for  the  rest  of  Europe.  England,  on 
the  contrary,  was  ruled  by  divided  counsels.     The  great 


22  Eiujllsli  LiUratupe. 

dramatists  held  their  position  by  reason  of  their  close  re- 
lation with  the  people.  Yet  the  court  followed  the  pre- 
vailing fashions  of  Spain  and  Italy. 

IV.  Let  us  take,  for  instance,  those  whom  Dr.  Johnson 
called  the  metaphysical  poets,  as  if  metaphysics  were  sy- 
nonymous with  obscurity.  According  to  him,  "  They  were 
wholly  employed  on  something  unexpected  and  surprising. 
.  .  .  Their  courtship  was  void  of  fondness,  and  their  lamen- 
tation of  sorrow.  Their  wish  was  only  to  say  what  they 
hoped  had  never  been  said  before."  Yet,  he  acknowledged, 
"  great  labor,  directed  by  gTeat  ability,  is  never  wholly  lost ; 
if  they  frequently  threw  away  their  wit  upon  false  con- 
ceits, they  likewise  sometimes  struck  out  unexpected  truth ; 
if  their  conceits  were  far-fetched,  they  were  often  worth  the 
carriage. ...  If  their  greatness  seldom  elevates,  their  acute- 
ness  often  surprises;  if  the  imagination  is  not  always  grati- 
fied, at  least  the  powers  of  reflection  and  comparison  ai'e 
employed  ;  and  in  the  mass  of  materials  which  ingenious 
absurdity  has  thrown  together,  genuine  and  useful  knowl- 
edge may  be  sometimes  found  buried,  perhaps,  in  grossness 
of  expression,  but  useful  to  those  who  know  their  value  ; 
and  such  as,  when  they  are  expanded  to  perspicuity  and 
polished  to  elegance,  may  give  lustre  to  works  which  have 
more  propriety,  though  less  copiousness,  of  sentiment."" 
Donne  and  Cowley  were  the  chief  offenders  whom  Dr. 
Johnson  brings  into  court.  Donne  was  borne  in  1573, 
nine  years  after  Shakspere,  and  he  died  in  1631,  so  that  it 
is  impossible  to  charge  him  with  being  the  product  of  a 
degenerate  age.  Dr.  Johnson  quotes  many  examples  of 
his  poetry  to  show  that  the  characteristics  of  his  school 
were  "enormous  and  disgusting  liy])erboles,"  "unexpected 
and  unnatural  thoughts,"  "violent  and  unnatural  Actions," 
"  slight  and  trifling  sentiments."     He  quotes  from  Donne  : 


English  Literature.  23 

"Though  God  be  our  true  glass  through  which  we  see 
All,  since  the  being  of  all  things  is  he, 
Yet  are  the  trunks,  which  do  to  us  derive 
Things  in  proportion  fit,  by  perspective 
Deeds  of  good  men ;  for  by  their  living  here, 
Virtues,  indeed  remote,  seem  to  be  near." 

and  asks,  "  Who  but  Donne  would  have  thought  that  a 
good  man  is  a  telescope  ?"  Yet  naturally,  in  writing  the 
life  of  Cowley,  he  had  most  to  say  about  the  form  which 
the  fault  took  in  that  writer.  Now,  to  understand  Donne's 
position,  it  is  essential  to  remember  that  the  poetry  of  the 
time  of  Elizabeth  was  of  two  kinds,  that  of  the  stage  and 
that  of  the  court.  That  of  the  stage  was  the  expression 
of  the  national  feeling  ;  that  of  the  court  was  the  expres- 
sion of  but  a  small  number  of  cultivated  people  familiar 
with  Spanish  and  Italian  literatures,  who  were  already 
affected  by  the  euphuism  which  Lyly's  "Euphues" 
(1580)  introduced  into  England  by  those  foreign  sources. 
An  example  of  it  may  be  found  in  Shakspere's  "Love's 
Labour's  Lost,"  where  are  these  lines  (L  i.  163)  : 

"  Our  court,  you  know,  is  haunted 

With  a  refined  traveller  of  Spain  : 
A  man  in  all  the  world's  new  fashion  planted. 

That  hath  a  mint  of  phrases  in  his  brain  ; 
One  whom  the  music  of  his  own  vain  tongue 

Doth  ravish  like  enchanting  harmony ;" 

and  later  in  the  play  the  King  of  Navarre  and  his  lords  for- 
swear 

"  Taffeta  phrases,  silken  terms  precise. 

Three-piled  hyperboles,  spruce  affectation, 

Figures  pedantical ;" 

and  determine  to  woo  henceforth 

"  In  russet  yeas  and  honest  kersey  noes." 

Sidney's  "Sonnets"  (1591)  show  the  same  tendency  to 


24  English  Literature. 

making  a  display  of  wit,  and  Donne  carries  the  tendency- 
very  far.  The  affectations  that  marked  the  metaphysical 
school  then  were  not  mere  inventions  of  a  later  time  ; 
they  were  not  a  reaction  against  the  vigor  of  the  play- 
writers  :  they  w^ere  rather  one  of  the  forms  in  which  the 
renewed  intellectual  excitement  of  the  Renaissance  found 
expression.  The  fantastic  poetry  was  coincident  in  time 
with  the  glory  of  the  English  stage,  and  some  of  the  poets, 
who  when  they  wrote  for  the  court  racked  heaven  and 
earth  for  all  sorts  of  conceits,  wrote  plays  which  are 
models  of  dignity  and  vigor  :  Beaumont  is  an  instance. 
In  fact,  it  is  impossible  to  overlook  a  certain  resemblance 
between  the  literary  school  of  the  court  at  the  time  of 
Elizabeth  and  the  neo-romantic  aestheticism  of  the  present 
day.  The  language  and  emotions  of  Bunthorne,  for  in- 
stance, may  represent  for  us  something  which  will  enable 
us  to  understand  how  euphuism  and  its  results  struck  our 
ancestors. 

When  the  stage  was  in  its  prime,  the  metaphysical 
school  was  less  prominent  :  the  poems  were  read,  but  they 
do  not  to  our  mind  stand  as  representatives  of  that  period. 
Yet  their  influence  remained  ;  and  when  the  stage  lost  its 
glory,  and  the  popular  impulse  that  inspired  it  took  the 
form  of  Puritanic  zeal,  the  literature  of  the  court  remained 
true  to  its  old  principles  of  literary  afi^ectation,  and  Cow- 
ley (1618-1667)  preserved  very  closely  the  traditions  of 
the  school  of  Donne.  It  is  easy  to  turn  Cowley  into  i-idi- 
cule.  Dr.  Johnson,  as  I  have  said,  collected  a  number  of 
ludicrous  bits  from  his  poems.     For  example  : 

"  All  armed  in  brass,  the  richest  dress  of  war 
(A  dismal  glorious  sight !),  he  shone  afar. 
The  sun  himself  started  with  sudden  fright, 
To  see  his  beams  return  so  dismal  bright ;" 

and  this  : 


EncjUsh  Literature.  25 

"His  bloody  eyes  lie  hurls  round,  bis  sharp  paws 
Tear  up  the  ground ;  then  runs  he  wild  about, 
Lashing  his  angry  tail  and  roaring  out. 
Beasts  creep  into  their  dens,  and  tremble  there ; 
Trees,  though  no  wind  is  stirring,  shake  with  fear  ; 
Silence  and  horror  fill  the  place  around  ; 
Echo  itself  dares  scarce  repeat  the  sound ;" 

or  this  ode  to  the  Muse  : 

"  Go,  the  rich  chariot  instantly  prepare; 
The  queen,  my  muse,  will  take  the  air  : 
Unruly  Fancy  with  strong  Judgment  trace ; 
Put  in  nimble-footed  Wit, 
Smooth-paced  Eloquence  join  with  it ; 
Sound  Memory  with  young  Invention  place  ; 
Harness  all  the  winged  race : 
Let  the  postilion  Nature  mount,  and  let 
The  coachman  Art  be  set ; 
And  let  the  airy  footmen,  running  all  beside. 
Make  a  long  row  of  goodly  pride. 
Figures,  Conceits,  Raptures,  and  Sentences, 
In  a  well-worded  dress  ; 

And  innocent  Loves,  and  pleasant  Truths,  and  rueful  Lies, 
In  all  their  gaudy  liveries. 
Mount,  glorious  queen  !  thy  travelling  throne. 
And  bid  it  to  put  on,"  etc. 

It  is  not  bard  to  imagine  the  emotions  with  which  Dr. 
Johnson  must  have  read  these  lines.  Yet  Cowley  was 
better  than  bis  faults.  His  poem  on  the  death  of  Hervey 
contains  some  fine  passages  : 

"  Say,  for  you  saw  us,  ye  immortal  lights. 
How  oft  unwearied  have  we  spent  the  nights, 
Till  the  Ledasan  stars,  so  fam'd  for  love. 

Wonder' d  at  us  from  above ! 
We  spent  them  not  in  toys,  in  lusts,  or  wine; 
But  search  of  deep  philosophy. 
Wit,  eloquence,  and  poetry. 
Arts  which  I  loved,  for  they,  my  friend,  were  thine." 
■     2 


26  English  Literature. 

While  Cowley,  after  all,  did  service  to  the  mechanism 
of  literature  by  his  ingenuity,  even  if,  as  Dryden  said, 
"  he  could  never  forgive  any  conceit  which  came  in  his 
way,  but  swept,  like  a  drag-net,  great  and  small,"  it  was 
Waller  who  more  especially  struck  out  the  path  Avhich 
was  to  be  followed  for  about  two  hundred  years  ;  and  to 
do  that  is  what  falls  to  the  lot  of  but  few  writers.  That 
Waller  should  have  been  the  man  to  do  it,  is  a  thought 
that  may  arouse  the  hopes  of  the  most  diffident.  To  us 
he  is  simply  the  author  of  "  Go,  Lovely  Rose,"  and  the 
lines  "  On  a  Girdle  ;"  his  other  poems  rest  untouched  on 
the  shelf.  Dryden  said  of  him  :  "  The  excellence  and  dig- 
nity of  rhyme  were  never  fully  known  till  Mr.  Waller 
taught  it  ;  he  first  made  writing  easily  an  art,  first  showed 
us  to  conclude  the  sense,  most  commonly,  in  distichs,  which 
in  the  verse  of  those  before  him  runs  on  for  so  many  lines 
together  that  the  reader  is  out  of  breath  to  overtake  it." 
That  is  to  say.  Waller  was  the  first  English  poet  to  use 
the  couplet.  He  began  with  it  in  a  poem  written  about 
1623  (he  was  born  in  1605,  and  died  in  1687)  in  a  poem, 
"  Of  the  Danger  his  Majesty  [being  Prince]  Escaped  in  the 
Road  at  St.  Andoro  " — 

"  These  mighty  peers  phiced  in  the  gilded  barge, 
Proud  with  the  burden  of  so  brave  a  charge, 
With  painted  oars  the  youths  began  to  sweep 
Neptune's  smooth  face,  and  cleave  the  yielding  deep ; 
"Which  soon  becomes  the  seat  of  sudden  w-ar 
Between  the  wind  and  tide  that  fiercely  jar. 
As  when  a  sort  of  lusty  shepherds  try 
Their  force  at  football,  care  of  victory 
Makes  them  salute  so  rudely  breast  to  breast, 
That  their  encounter  seems  too  rough  for  jest ; 
They  ply  their  feet,  and  still  the  restless  ball, 
Tossed  to  and  fro  is  urged  by  them  all. 
So  fares  the  doubtful  barge  'twixt  tiih'  and  winds 
And  like  effect  of  their  contention  finds." 


English  Literature.  2/ 

The  sea  gets  rougher,  however, 

"  And  now  no  hope  of  grace 
Among  them  shines,  save  in  the  Prince's  face ; 

m  Hf  *  *  * 

The  gentle  vessel  (wont  with  state  and  pride 
On  the  smooth  back  of  silver  Thames  to  ride) — " 

It  will  be  noticed  that  boats  sail  on  the  "  smooth  face  "  of 
Neptune  and  on  the  "  smooth  back  "  of  rivers — 

"  Wanders  astonished  on  the  angry  main. 
***** 

The  pale  Iberians  had  expired  with  fear, 
But  that  their  wonder  did  divert  their  care, 
To  see  the  Prince  with  danger  moved  no  more 
Than  with  the  pleasures  of  their  court  before ; 
Godlike  his  courage  seemed,  whom  nor  delight 
Could  soften,  nor  the  face  of  death  affright. 
Next  to  the  power  of  making  tempests  cease. 
Was  in  that  storm  to  have  so  calm  a  peace." 

Certainly  the  outlook  was  bad  for  poetry  when  lines 
such  as  these  should  set  a  fashion.  They  were  the  model 
which  all  the  writers  who  hoped  for  success  were  grad- 
ually obliged  to  follow,  I  could  find  passages  in  Waller's 
heroic  measure  less  grotesque  than  this  one,  of  which  the 
sole  merit,  it  seems  to  me,  is  technical  correctness  ;  and  as 
a  favorable  specimen  I  would  mention  his  panegyric  on 
Cromwell,  Yet  the  lines  just  read  have  been  admired  in 
their  day,  and  may,  without  extreme  unfairness,  show 
what  it  was  that  gave  him  for  a  time  the  name  of  the 
greatest  English  poet.  In  his  straining  for  classical  illus- 
trations we  see  very  much  the  same  quality  that  is  to  be 
noticed  in  Cowley.  Waller,  in  order  to  convince  us  that 
a  storm  was  really  severe,  tells  us,  "  Great  Maro  could  no 
greater  tempest  feign  ;"  and  Cowley  says  that  his  heart 
was  an  Etna,  which  enclosed  Cupid's  forge  instead  of  Vul- 
can's shop.     Allusions  to  the  classics  were  for  a  long  time 


28  English  Literature. 

the  common  tools  of  poets.  It  is  in  the  short  pieces,  how- 
ever, that  Waller's  conceits  are  most  striking,  as,  for  in- 
stance, in  the  one  on  the  head  of  a  stag  : 

"  0  fertile  head  !  which  erery  year 
Could  such  a  crop  of  wonder  bear  I 
The  teeming  earth  did  never  bring 
So  soon,  so  hard,  so  huge  a  thing ; 
Which  might  it  never  have  been  cast, 
(Each  year's  growth  added  to  the  last) 
These  lofty  branches  had  supplied 
The  earth's  bold  sons'  prodigious  pride, 
Heaven  with  these  engines  had  l>eeu  scaled, 
When  mountains  heaped  on  mountains  failed." 

In  general,  indeed,  we  may  say  that  Waller's  lyrics  are 
very  cold.  It  was  for  his  management  of  the  heroic 
couplet  especially  that  he  was  admired.  This  measure 
had  long  been  in  use  ;  it  was  Chaucer's  favorite  form,  and 
was  derived,  doubtless,  from  the  French  writers  whom 
he  knew  and  the  Italian  writers  whom  he  translated.  It 
Avas  employed  by  numberless  later  writers,  and  generally, 
among  the  metaphysical  school  at  least,  it  had  become 
very  rough  and  graceless.  Thus  Donne  wrote  ("An 
Anatomy  of  the  World,"  in  Works,  p.  88)  : 

"  Seas  are  so  deep,  tliat  whales  being  struck  to-day, 
Perchance  to-morrow  scarce  at  middle  way 
'  Of  their  wished  journey's  end,  the  bottom,  die : 

And  men,  to  sound  depths,  so  much  line  untie. 
As  one  might  justly  think  that  there  would  rise 
At  end  thereof  one  of  the  antipodes : 
If  under  all  a  vault  infernal  be, 
Which  sure  is  spacious,  except  that  we 
Invent  another  torment,  that  there  must 
Millions  into  a  strait  hot  room  be  thrust. 
Then  solidncss  and  roundness  have  no  place."  .  .  . 


English  Literature.  29 

There  is  no  need  of  giving  other  examples  of  the  way 
English  writers  let  the  sense  run  into  any  desired  number 
of  lines  by  means  of  what  are  called  enjambments.  Wal- 
ler was  the  first  English  writer  who  treated  the  couplet  as 
a  unit  separate  and  coherent — as,  so  to  speak,  a  shapely, 
well-defined  brick  as  compared  with  the  stone  of  different 
sizes  that  previous  artisans  made  use  of.*  Before  he  died 
he  found  the  couplet  universally  adopted. 

*  It  may  be  said  that  Waller  accomplished  what  many  were  essaying, 
and  that  he  gave  the  awkwai'd  couplet  a  new  grace.  Here  are  some 
further  examples  of  its  earlier  treatment  (Peyton's  "  Glasse  of  Time," 
1620,  p.  15): 

"  We  have,  great  God,  that  which  these  never  knew, 

Thine  own  example  and  the  scripture  true, 

Thy  all  divine  and  holy  moral  law 

Which  these  as  yet  have  never  heard  or  saw." 
T.  May,  "  The  Victorious  Reigne  of  Edward  III.,"  1635,  lib.  ii. ; 
"  Nor  yet  had  Edward  in  his  active  mind 

The  claim  and  conquest  of  great  France  designed, 

Nor  looked  abroad ;  domestic  businesse 

Employ'd  his  early  manhood  ;  the  redresse 

Of  those  distempers  which  had  grown  at  home 

Too  great  for  any  youth  to  overcome. 

But  such  a  youth  as  his,  had  yet  detained 

His  spirit  there."  .  .  . 

In  the  "  Obsequies  to  the  Memorie  of  Mr.  Edward  King,"  1638,  the  vol- 
ume in  which  Milton's  "Lycidas"  first  appeared,  thirteen  of  the  elegies 
were  in  English.  Of  the  twelve — i.  e.,  excluding  the  "  Lycidas " — seven 
were  in  the  measure  of  five  feet,  three  of  four  feet,  the  other  two  of  six 
feet.     One  of  the  seven  runs  thus : 

"  No, Death!     I'll  not  examine  God's  decree, 
Nor  question  Providence  in  chiding  thee. 
Discreet  Religion  binds  us  to  admire 
The  ways  of  Providence  and  not  inquire." 

See  also  Joseph  Hall's  verses,  infra,  and  compare  Sylvester's  "Du 
Bartas." 


30  EnyliaJL  Llteraiui'e. 

What  the  couplet  did  was  to  replace  the  stanza  :  it 
had  previously  been  employed  for  rather  light  subjects, 
and  Puttenham,  in  his  "Art  of  English  Poesie"   (1589), 

affirmed   that  the  stanza  alone  was   suitable   for  serious 

I  topics.  Indeed,  as  Mr.  Mark  Pattison  has  shown  (Intro- 
duction to  his  edition  of  Pope's  "Essay  on  Man,"  p.  19), 
"the  stanza  in  verse  is  the  analogue  of  the  prose  sentence 
as  constructed  by  Hooker,  Jeremy  Taylor,  or  Milton. 
Each  of  these  stately  periods  carries  along  with  it,  over 
and  above  its  direct  predication,  all  the  conditions  and  ex- 
ceptions to  which  the  writer  wishes  to  submit  that  pred- 
ication, all  woven  into  one  structure.  There  is  in  each 
stanza  or  sentence  so  much  as  fills  the  mind  to  the  utmost 
strain  of  its  cajjacity  for  attention  ;  and  then  a  pause  for 

I    reflection  and  digestion." 

U  Take  for  an  example  any  stanza  from  the  "  Fairy 
Queen"  (IV.  2,  xvi.,  for  instance)  : 

"  As  when  two  warlike  brigandines  at  sea, 
With  murderous  weapous  arm'd  to  cruel  figlit, 
Do  meet  together  on  the  watery  lea, 
They  stem  each  other  with  so  fell  despiglit, 
That  with  the  shock  of  their  own  heedless  might 
Their  wooden  ribs  are  shaken  nigh  asunder  ; 
They  which  from  shore  behold  the  dreadful  sight 
Of  flashing  fire,  and  hear  tKe  ordnance  thunder, 

Do  greatly  stand  amaz'd  at  such  unwonted  wonder." 

Mr.  Pattison  goes  on  :  "  The  same  process  which  broke 
up  the  composite  period  of  earlier  prose  into  the  disjoint- 
ed modern  style  of  short  sentences  took  place  in  verse. 
The  stanza  gradually  gave  way  before  the  couplet."  * 

*  It  is  wortli  while  noticing,  however,  how  long  it  was  before  the  couplet 
lost  its  elasticity.  At  first,  it  was  broken  by  cnjanibments  ;  in  AValler's 
hands  it  admitted  of  almost  any  prolongation  of  the  sentence.  Dryden, 
too,  wrote  whole  paragraphs  in  this  measure.     Not  until  Pope's  time  did 


EiKjliiift  L'dtvature.  31 

Denhani'is  another  author  to  whom  the  later  poets 
(Prior,  for  instance)  expressed  their  indebtedness  for  the 
couplet.  A  few  lines  from  his  "Cooper's  Hill"  (1643) 
will  show,  I  think,  that  he  had  considerable  mastery  of 
versification,  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  the  sense  is  contin- 
ued from  verse  to  verse  : 

"  So  fares  the  stag ;  among  the  enraged  hounds, 
Repels  their  force,  and  wounds  returns  for  wounds ; 
And  as  a  hero,  wliom  Iiis  baser  foes 
In  troops  surround,  now  these  assails,  now  those. 
Though  prodigal  of  life,  disdains  to  die 
By  common  hands  ;  but  if  he  can  descry 
Some  nobler  foe  appi-oach,  to  him  he  calls. 
And  begs  his  fate,  and  then  contented  falls." 

Certainly  these  lines  have  something  of  the  smoothness 
which  Ave  have  learned  to  associate  with  the  couplet,  and 
elsewhere  in  his  writings  we  may  find  instances  of  greater 
mechanical  skill.  In  this  very  poem,  it  may  be  worth 
while  to  mention,  are  these  lines,  which  were  the  despair 
of  the  later  poets  of  the  school  : 

"  0  could  I  flow  like  thee,  and  make  thy  stream 
My  great  example,  as  it  is  my  theme  ! 
Though  deep,  yet  clear  ;  tho'  gentle,  yet  not  dull ; 
Strong  without  rage,  without  o'erliowing,  full." 

Another  instance  of  the  decay  of  the  stanza  and  a  proof 
that  the  change  was  not  wholly  due  to  French  influence — 
although  few  will  think  that  any  change  of  the  sort  has 
but  one  cause — is  Davenant's  "  Gondibert  "  (1650).  This 
is  a  most  tedious  poem,  which  would  never  be  read,  even 

it  become  the  chain,  with  small  links,  that  held  thought  firm.  We  see  the 
same  gradual  growth  in  the  French  heroic  verse  (of  twelve  syllables).  Du 
Bartas  and  Ronsard  let  the  sense  run  through  many  couplets  ;  this  was 
one  of  Malherbe's  main  objections  to  his  predecessors.  And  it  was  only 
under  BoUeau  that  the  couplet  finally  became  a  rigid  unit. 


32  A)i(/liiih  Literature. 

if  it  were  short,  and  which  has  acquired  a  mock  impor- 
tance by  its  length,  with,  however,  here  and  there  occa- 
sional poetical  lines  to  relieve  the  reader's  weariness.  I 
will  quote  one  or  two  of  these  passages,  which  may  also 
serve  to  illustrate  the  form  of  the  stanza  : 

"Her  mind  (scarce  to  her  feeble  sex  akin) 

Did  as  her  birth,  her  right  to  empire  sliow ; 
Seem'd  careless  outward  wheu  employ'd  within  ; 
Her  speech,  like  lovers  watch'd,  was  kind  and  low." 

And  these  descriptions  of  the  opening  day  : 

"  As  day  new  opening  fills  the  hemisphere. 
And  all  at  once  ;  so  quickly  every  street 
Does  by  an  instant  opening  full  appear, 

When  from  their  dwellings  busy  dwellers  meet. 

"  From  wider  gates  oppressors  sally  there ; 

Here  creeps  th'  afflicted  through  a  narrow  door ; 
Groans  under  wrongs  he  has  not  strength  to  bear, 
Yet  seeks  for  wealth  to  injure  others  more. 
***** 
"  Here  stooping  lab'rers  slowly  moving  are  ; 

Beasts  to  the  rich,  whose  strength  grows  rude  with  ease; 
And  would  usurp,  did  not  their  rulers'  care 

With  toil  and  tax  their  furious  strength  appease." 

In  the  preface  to  this  tolerably  unreadable  poem — the 
preface,  by  the  way,  was  in  the  form  of  a  letter  to  Thomas 
Hobl)es,  the  author  of  the  "  Leviathan  " — Davenant  ex- 
plains "  why  I  have  chosen  my  interwoven  stanza  of  four, 
though  I  am  not  obliged  to  excuse  the  choice  ;  for  num- 
bers in  verse  must,  like  distinct  kinds  of  music,  be  exposed 
to  the  uncertain  and  dilferent  taste  of  several  ears.  Yet 
I  may  declare  that  I  believed  it  would  be  more  pleasant 
to  the  reader,  in  a  work  of  length,  to  give  this  respite  or 
pause  between  every  stanza  (having  endeavoured  that 
each    should    contain    a   period)  than  to  run  him  out  of 


Englhh  Literalwi^e.  33 

breath  with  continued  couplets.  Nor  doth  alternate  rime 
by  any  lowliness  of  cadence  make  the  sound  less  heroic, 
but  rather  adapt  it  to  a  plain  and  stately  composing  of 
music  ;  and  the  brevity  of  the  stanza  renders  it  less  subtle 
to  the  composer,  and  more  easy  to  the  singer,  which  in 
stilo  recitativo,  when  the  story  is  long,  is  chiefly  requisite. 
And  this  was  indeed  (if  I  shall  not  betray  vanity  in  my 
confession)  the  reason  that  prevailed  most  towards  my 
choice  of  this  stanza,  and  my  division  of  the  main  work 
into  cantos,  every  canto  including  a  sufficient  accomplish- 
ment of  some  worthy  design  or  action,  for  I  had  so  much 
heat,  which  you,  sir,  may  call  pride,  as  to  presume  they 
might  (like  the  works  of  Homer  ere  they  Avere  joyned 
together  and  made  a  volume  by  the  Athenian  king)  be 
sung  at  village-feasts  ;  though  not  to  monarchs  after  vic- 
tory, nor  to  armies  before  battle.  For  so  (as  an  inspira- 
tion of  glory  into  the  one,  and  of  valour  into  the  other) 
did  Homer's  spirit,  long  after  his  body's  rest,  wander  in 
music  about  Greece."  Hobbes,  by  the  way,  acknowledged 
this  statement  by  assuring  Davenant  that  "  but  for  the 
clamour  of  the  multitude,  that  hide  their  envy  of  the 
present  under  a  reverence  of  antiquity,  I  should  say  fur- 
ther that  it  would  last  as  long  as  the  Iliad  or  the  ^neid." 
When  all  is  said,  we  find  a  precedent  for  the  use  of  this 
measure  in  Sir  John  Davies's  "Nosce  Teipsum"  (1599), 
although  in  this  older  poem  the  sense  runs  over  from  one 
stanza  into  a  second  or  third.  Wyatt  had  also  employed 
it  in  his  poem,  "The  Lover  Describeth  his  being  taken 
with  Sight  of  his  Love,"  as  had  the  Earl  of  Oxford 
in  1576,  in  a  poem  prefixed  to  Bedingfield's  Cardanus. 
Dryden  made  use  of  it  in  his  stanzas  on  the  "Death  of 
Oliver  Cromwell"  (1658),  and,  after  also  trying  the  coup- 
let, in  his  "Annus  Mirabilis"  (1666).  After  that  time, 
however,  he  kept  to  the  couplet,  save,  of  course,  in  his 

2* 


34  Englhh   Literature. 

odes.  So  that  AValler  had  the  satisfaction  of  living  to 
see  the  measures  that  he  introduced  become  the  jDrevail- 
ing  form. 

V.  I  have  to  this  point  tried  to  give  a  sketch  of  the 
change  in  the  poetical  forms,  and  to  show  the  different 
steps  in  this  change.     The  question  now  suggests  itself  : 

rWhy  was  the  change  made  ?  In  what  way  was  it  possi- 
ble that  the  age  should  be  deaf  to  the  majesty  of  Milton's 
line  and  prefer  Cowley,  Waller,  and  the  playwrights  ? 
But  when  could  Milton  be  a  popular  poet  ?  Even  now, 
when  his  place  is  secured  among  the  greatest  of  writers, 
we  read  him,  if  we  read  him  at  all,  at  some  time  from  a 
sense  of  duty,  and  then  most  of  us  return  to  him  only  fit- 
fully, as  indeed  we  do  to  most  great  winters.  And  then, 
when  Milton  wrote  his  finest  poems,  he  was  the  lonely 
singer  of  a  fallen  cause,  and  Puritanism  meant  to  his  con- 
temporaries a  narrow  theology,  a  bigoted  view  of  human 
life,  and  the  unsoundest  political  principles.  We  see  that 
Milton  was  one  of  the  last  of  the  great  poets,  and  that  he 
was  great  because,  with  his  magnificent  poetical  equip- 
ment, he  represented  a  great  principle  of  national  life  ;  and 
this  has  always  been  part  of  the  inspiration  of  the  greatest 
poets.  Homer  is  the  poet  of  remote  antiquity  ;  iEschylus 
and  Sophocles  of  Greece  in  her  prime  ;  Vergil,  of  imperial 
Rome  ;  Dante,  of  the  Middle  Ages  ;  Chaucer,  of  awakening 
England  ;  Shakspere  of  England  in  a  'time  of  vigor  and 
enthusiasm  ;  Milton,  of  Puritanism  ;  Goethe,  of  Germanv  ; 
and — it  seems  to  me — it  is  their  quality  as  representatives 
which  so  much  outweighs  literary  performance  of  no  mat- 
ter what  degree  of  excellence.  Puritanism  was  inspired  by 
some  of  the  most  marked  traits  of  the  English  character, 
and  Milton  brought  to  its  service  very  com])lete  training. 
Puritanism  flourished  and  died,  though  it  made  a  deep 
mark  on  both  England  and  America,  and  left    Bunvan's 


English  Literature.  35 

prose  *  and  Milton's  poetry  to  show  how  important  a  part 
it  had  played  in  English  history  ;  and  it  showed,  too,  in 
Milton's  faults  how  narrowing  it  was.  ^ 

Milton's  fame  was  something  which  depended  a  good 
deal  on  politics.     After  1688  the  Liberals  admired  him, 

*  It  would  be  interesting  to  study  the  gradual  growth  of  Bunyan's  fame 
in  the  last  two  hundred  years.  The  popularity  of  the  "  Pilgrim's  Progress" 
was  always  acknowledged,  but  it  was  frequently  spoken  of  as  a  book  suit- 
able only  for  the  populace.  Dr.  Young,  "  Sat."  V.  iii.  147,  speaking  of  a 
newly  married  couple  : 

"  With  the  fourth  sun  a  warm  dispute  arose 
On  Durfey's  poesy  and  Bunyan's  prose." 
D'Urfey's  poetry  was  notoriously  beneath  contempt. 

John  Dunton  (for  whom  v'lde  infra\  in  a  talk  with  the  libr;tiian  of  Har- 
vard College,  said,  "  Nor  must  I  omit  aniongst  these  great  names  [Tillot- 
son,  Jeremy  Taylor,  Baxter,  Mrs.  Katharine  Phillips,  Mrs.  Behn — for  Dun- 
ton's  taste  was  catholic — and  Mrs.  Rowe],  to  mention  that  of  Mr.  John  Bun- 
yan,  who,  though  a  man  of  very  ordinary  education,  yet  was  a  man  of  great 
natural  parts,  and  as  well  known  for  an  author  throughout  England  as  any 
I  have  mentioned,  by  the  many  books  he  has  published,  of  which  the  'Pil- 
grim's Progress'  bears  away  the  bell"  (_vide  his  "Letters  from  New  Eng- 
land" (Boston,  \mi),  p.  159). 

Swift,  in  "A  Letter  to  a  Young  Clergyman  :"  "  I  have  been  better  enter- 
tained, and  more  informed,  by  a  few  pages  in  the  '  Pilgrim's  Progress,' 
than  by  a  long  discourse  on  the  will  and  the  intellect,  and  simple  or  com- 
plex ideas." 

Sterne,  "  Tristram  Shandy,"  i.  chap.  iv. :  "  My  life  and  opinions  .  .  .  will 
...  be  no  less  read  than  the  'Pilgrim's  Progress'  itself." 

Vide  Knox,  "Essa)'s,"  No.  9'i  :  "Bunyan's  'Pilgrim's  Progress'  has 
given  as  much  pleasure  among  the  English  vulgar  as  the  '  Quixote '  of 
Cervantes." 

Dr.  Johnson  said  it  was  the  only  uninspired  book,  except  "  Don  Quixote," 
which  the  reader  ever  wished  were  longer. 

Cowper  apologizes  for  referring  to  him : 

"  I  name  thee  not  lest  so  despised  a  name, 
Sliould  move  a  sneer  at  thy  deserved  fame." — Tirocinium. 

It  is  only  in  this  century,  since  the  Romantic  revival,  that  the  prejudice 
against  its  simplicity  and  media'val  origin  lias  been  removed. 


36  English  Literature. 

and  even  a  hundred  years  later  Johnson,  who  was  a  hot 
Tory,  attacked  him  in  his  "  Lives  of  the  Poets."  *  Of  Mil- 
ton's influence  w^e  shall  have  occasion  to  speak  later.  We 
can,  to  be  sure,  find  comjiliments  to  him  in  some  of  the 
writings  of  the  time  of  the  Restoration,  but  most  of  the 
authors  neglected  him,  although  I  fancy  that  his  popular- 
ity in  this  country  among  people  of  moderate  taste  in  poe- 
try proves  that  in  England  he  was  read  by  the  survivors 
of  the  Puritans.  Then,  too,  his  harmonious  rhythm  in- 
spired, as  we  shall  see,  a  great  deal  of  tumid  blank  verse. 
The  real  interest  of  the  nation  went  with  its  contemporary 
writers,  and  in  the  race  for  popularity  modernness  is  always 
tolerably  sure  to  outrun  antiquity,  and  Milton  soon  appeared 
like  a  stranded  classic.  The  edition  of  1688,  the  publication 
of  which  was  almost  a  political  move,  did  much  to  redeem 
the  neglect  from  which  Milton's  fame  had  been  suffering. 

Even  now  we  are  repelled  by  the  tedious  theology  and 
the  classical  form  of  the  "  Paradise  Lost."  IIow  must  they 
have  seemed  when  the  modern  spirit  had  the  additional 
charm  of  novelty  ? 

The  Elizabethan  poets  wrote  under  the  inspiration  of  a 
strong  feeling.  As  this  decayed,  men  sought  first  to 
make  it  good  by  fierce  language.  Take,  for  example,  these 
lines  from  Davenant's  "Albovine,"  as  a  specimen  of  the 
hero's  method  of  courtship  : 

"  Fill  me  a  bowl  with  negro's  blood,  congealed 
Even  into  livers  !     Tell  her,  Hermegild, 
ril  swallow  tar  to  celebrate  her  health." 

Evidently  language  of  this  sort  contains  signs  of  decay, 

*  The  political  bias  was  long-lived.  Clough,  writing  from  Oxford,  in 
1838,  says  :  "  It  is  difficult  here  even  to  obtain  assent  to  Milton's  greatness 
as  a  poet.  .  .  .  Were  it  not  for  the  happy  notion  that  a  man's  poetry  is  not 
at  all  affected  by  his  opinions,  ...  I  fear  the  '  Paradise  Lost '  would  be 
utterly  unsalable,  except  for  waste  paper  in  the  university  "  (i.  80). 


English  Literature.  37 

and  must  soon  give  place  to  something  different.  The 
courtiers,  wlio  could  endure  declamation  of  that  sort,  said 
that  Milton's  harmonies  sounded  like  the  rumbling  of  a 
wheelbarrow  ;*  they  were  equally  deaf  to  the  charm  of  the 
old  lyrics,  and  put  into  short  lines  a  vast  number  of  feeble 
sentiments.  The  songs  of  the  Restoration  ask  for  but 
little  attention.  We  may  find  in  Waller  a  few  excellent 
lyrics,  as  well  as  such  poems  as  "  The  Lady  who  can  Sleep 
when  she  Pleases,"  "  Of  a  Tree  Cut  in  Paper  ;"  in  Roscom- 
mon, lines  "  On  the  Death  of  a  Lady's  Dog,"  f  and  a  "  Song 
on  a  Young  Lady  who  Sung  Finely,  and  was  Afraid  of 
a  Cold."  Rochester,  too,  wrote  some  verses  which  are 
marked  with  some  slight  ingenuity,  but  since  we  are  now 
following  mainly  the  broader  streams  of  literature,  we  may 
leave  for  the  present  this  side-current. 

The  brief  examination  that  w^e  have  ofiven  will  be  suffi- 


cient to  show  us  that  the  outlook  for  literature  after  the 
R_^estoration  was  a  very  dreary  one.  We  have  but  touclied 
upon   the   drama,  but  outside  of  that  we  have   seen  the 

-  decadence  of  the  greatest  inspiration,  the  neglect  of  real 
genius,  and  the  appearance  of  a  prosaic  period.  The  prob- 
]£m_that  lay^before  the  writers  of  that  day  was  a  compli- 
cated one.  Literature,  as  I  have  tried  to  point  out,  had 
broken  loose  from  the  people,  and  had  to  seek  support  from 

^the  court  until  a  pul>lic  of  readers  should  be  found— or, 
rather,  should  l)e  made.  A  proper  understaiiding  of^tlie 
absence  of  a  reading  ])ublic  is  necessary  for  understanding 
the  literature  of  the  last  centurj". 

*  Vide  Johnson's  "  Life  of  J.  Pliilips." 

t  Yet  when  shall  we  find  anjthing  new  ?     Joseph  Hall  sa3s  in  his  "  Sat- 
ires" (1598): 

"  Should  Bandel's  throstle  die  without  a  song  ? 

Or  Adaraantius,  my  dog,  be  laid  along, 
Down  in  some  ditch  without  his  exequies, 
Or  epitaphs,  or  mournful  elegies?" 

224S)r>8 


38  English  Literature. 


CHAPTER  II. 

I.  It  is  of  the  utmost  importance  that  we  understand_ 
clearly  hoAv  few  were  the  readers  in  the  latter  half  of  the 
sixteenth  century,  how  small  was  the  public  to  which 
authors  could  address  themselves.  The  Bible  and  Bun- 
yan  were  doubtless  widely  read;  probably  Milton's  "Para- 
dise Lost"  was  read  by  the  same  people,  but  this  new 
literature  was  far  removed  from  the  populace.  There  was 
but  little  literary  interest.  Books  could  not  be  printed 
without  a  license,  and  then  only  by  one  of  the  legal  print- 
ers, and  of  these  there  were"  but  twenty — master-printers, 
that  is  ;  and  in  1666  there  were  only  140  working-printers. 
Moreover,  the  great  fire  in  London,  in  that  year,  destroyed 
a  large  number  of  books.  Again,  there  are  statistics  to 
illustrate  this  :  between  1666  and  (after  the  fire)  June  12, 
1680,  there  were  published  3550  books.  Of  these,  947 
treated  of  theology,  the  larger  number  probably  l)eing 
sermons  and  pamphlets  ;  420  of  law,  and  153  of  medicine, 
two  fifths  thus  being  special,  technical  books  ;  397  were 
educational  books,  253  on  geography  and  navigation,  in- 
cluding maps.  The  number  of  books  of  all  kinds  would 
then  average  about  250  a  year  ;  but,  deducting  reprints, 
pamphlets,  tracts,  sermons,  maps,  etc.,  we  may  estimate  the 
number,  according  to  Cliarles  Knight,*  as  less  than  a  hun- 
dred a  year,  and  only  a  fcAV  of  these  belonged  to  what  we 

*  Quoted  by  Beljame,  "  Le  Public  ct  Ics  Homines  dc  Lottres." 


Englhh  Literature.  39 

may  call  literature.  As  Dr.  Johnson  said  in  his  "  Life  of 
Milton,"  "  the  call  for  books  was  not  in  Milton's  age  what 
it  is  at  pi-esent.  To  read  was  not  then  a  general  amusement; 
neither  traders,  nor  often  gentlemen,  thought  themselves 
disgraced  by  ignorance.  The  women  had  not  then  aspired 
to  literature,  nor  was  every  house  supplied  with  a  closet  of 
knowledge.  Those,  indeed,  who  professed  learning  were 
not  less  learned  than  at  any  other  time;  but  of  that  middle 
race  of  students  who  read  for  pleasure  or  accomplishment, 
and  who  buy  the  numerous  products  of  modern  typogra- 
phy, the  number  was  then  comparatively  small." 

And  it  was  small,  probably,  in  comparison  with  the  num- 
bers of  those  who  were  busy  readers  in  the  beginning  of 
the  century  and  in  the  latter  half  of  the  previous  one. 
Then  every  man  began  to  translate  from  the  classic  au- 
thors, or  to  rewrite  classic  stories.  Shakspere's  "  Venus 
and  Adonis"  (1593)  was  but  one  instance  of  this.  There 
were  Chapman's  "Homer"  ("Iliad,"  1611;  "Odyssey," 
1615);  Marston's  "Pygmalion's  Image"  (1597);  Marlowe's 
"Hero  and  Leander"  (1598),  and  his  "Elegies  of  Ovid" 
(1597);  Golding's  " Metamorphoses "  (1565),  and  Sandys's 
version  of  the  same  (1626).  In  1565,  Horace's  first  two 
Satires  were  translated  by  Thomas  Colwell  ;  in  the  next 
year,  two  books  of  the  Satires  were  "Englyshed"  by 
Thomas  Drant.  A  few  of  the  "  Odes  "  in  1621,  by  John 
Ashman,  and  the  Avhole  in  1625  by  Sir  Thomas  Hawkins. 
There  was  Gavin  Douglas's  translation  of  "  Vergil,"  fin- 
ished in  1513  ;  Surrey's  (2d  and  4th  books),  published  in 
1553;*  Phaer's  and  Twyne's  (1558-73);  Stanihurst's 
(1583);  Fleming's  " Georgics  and  Bucolics"  (1589),  in 
blank  verse  ;  and  then  Dryden's  (1697).    The  list  is  a  long 

*  The  first  English  blank  verse,  doubtless  written  in  imitation  of  that 
of  the  Italians,  Felice  Felignei,  and  Trissino,  whose  "Italia  Liberata" 
{ride  infra)  appeared  in  l.'SiS. 


40  English  Literature. 

one,  but  the  whole  number  of  books  published  then  on  all 
subjects  was  considerable,  and  at  that  time  the  proportion 
of  poems  and  books  about  literature  was  great.  As  I  have 
said,  this  enthusiasm  for  the  classics  had  a  great  share  in^ 
inspiring  the  writers  for  the  stage,  and  the  drama  was^ 
something  of  jjopular  interest.  _But  the  great  bulk  of  the 
English  people  drew  inspiration  from  the  Bible.  The  clas- 
sics became  the  property  of  the  learned  alone,  while  Puri- 
tanism grew  narrower.  We  may  see  its  course  illustrated 
by  what  we  know  of  Milton's  life.  He  was  brought  up 
amid  all  the  riches  of  literature  ;  he  studied  foreign  lan- 
guages and  foreign  literatures.  His  father  composed  music, 
and  Milton  was  interested  in  the  art ;  and  he  brought  to  the 
service  of  Puritanism  the  flower  of  the  cultivation  which 
was  produced  by  the  Renaissance,  and  published  his  great- 
est works  after  Puritanism  had  lost  its  power.  He  was  a 
sort  of  living  anachronism.  He  belonged  to  one  age,  which 
he  survived  ;  and  he  had  been  trained  in  an  earlier  one.  His 
education  was  unpuritan,  and_his^_poem  was  built  on  the 
inspiration  of  the  ancients,  yet  it  appeared  in  the  begm- 
ning  of  what  we  take  to  be  modern  times,  Not  only  had 
the  indirect  influence  of  Puritanism  been  unfavorable  to 
literature  ;  the  CivirWars  and  Cromwell's  rule  had  really 
produced  a  sort  of  interregnum  of  about  eighteen  years, 
during  which  poetry  and  the  drama  were  neglected  and 
nothing  flourished  but  polemical  writing,  so  that  Milton 
stands  out  in  especial  prominence  as  the  sole  transmitter 
of  earlier  traditions. 

Various  facts  have  been  collected  to  prove  the  general 
lack  of  education.  Milton's  eldest  daughter  did  not  know 
how  to  write  ;  at  least,  she  put  a  ci'oss  where  her  signa- 
ture should  be.  The  spelling  of  Dryden's  wife — a  lady 
of  noble  family — is  a  sort  of  unconscious  prophecy  of  the 
spelling  reform.     Booksellers,  naturally,  did  not  flourish 


English  Literature.  41 

at  this  time.  In  the  "  Life  of  the  Honourable  and  Rever- 
end Dr.  John  North"*  (p.  241  et  seq.),  we  find  a  com- 
parison between  the  condition  of  booksellers  in  1666  and 
1683.  At  the  earlier  time,  "the  shops  were  spacious  and 
the  learned  gladly  resorted  to  them,  where  they  seldom 
failed  to  meet  with  agreeable  conversation.  And  the  book- 
sellers themselves  were  knowing  and  conversible  men,  with 
whom,  for  the  sake  of  bookish  knowledge,  the  greatest 
Wits  were  pleased  to  converse.  .  .  .  But  now  this  Empo- 
rium is  vanished  and  the  Trade  contracted  into  the  Hands 
of  two  or  three  Persons,  who  to  make  good  their  Monop- 
oly, ransack,  not  only  the  Neighbours  of  the  Trade  that 
are  scattered  about  Town,  but  all  over  England,  aye,  and 
beyond  Sea  too,  and  send  abroad  their  Circulators,  and  in 
that  Manner  get  into  their  hands  all  that  is  valuable.  The 
rest  of  the  Trade  are  content  to  take  their  Refuse.  .  .  . 
And  it  is  wretched  to  consider  what  pickpocket  work,  with 
Help  of  the  Press,  these  Demi-booksellers  make.  They 
crack  their  brains  to  find  out  selling  subjects,  and  keep 
hirelings  in  garrets,  on  hard  meat,  to  write  and  correct  by 
the  grate  ;  so  puff  up  an  octavo  to  a  sufiicient  thickness," 
etc.,  etc.  In  these  distressing  circumstances,  editions  were 
small,  and  the  prices  paid  authors  low.  There  were  not 
more  than  1500  copies  in  each  edition  of  Milton,  and  1300 
copies  were  sold  in  two  years,  the  author  receiving  £5 
doAvn,  and  five  more  when  1300  were  sold  {vide  Johnson's 
"Life  of  Milton").  Doubtless  this  was  a  large  sale  for 
the  time,  for,  although  the  poem  did  not  please  the  court, 
it  evidently  found  readers  elsewhere.  And  pleasing  the 
court  was  far  from  meaning  that  the  writer  was  rewarded. 
Butler's  "  Hudibras  "  was  entirely  in  the  interest  of  the 
king  and  his  party,  and  when  the  first  three  cantos  ap- 

*  Quoted  by  Beljame. 


42  English  Literature. 

peared,  at  the  end  of  1662,  Lord  Buckhurst  made  it  known 
to  the  court,  and  every  one  was  laughing  over  the  story 
of  the  Presbyterian  justice  who  endeavored  to  put  down 
superstition  and  correct  current  abuses  :  the  curious  mix- 
ture of  a  knight-errant  and  a  pedantic  magistrate — a  Pres- 
byterian Don  Quixote,  The  king  read  it,  and  it  became 
the  fashion  of  the  day.  Pepys  (Dec.  26,  1662)  says  : 
"  Hither  came  Mr.  Battersby  ;  and  we  falling  into  dis- 
course of  a  new  book  of  drollery  in  use,  called  '  Hudi- 
bras,'  I  would  needs  go  find  it  out,  and  met  with  it  at  the 
Temple  :  cost  me  2s.  Qd.  But  when  I  come  to  read  it,  it 
is  so  silly  an  abuse  of  the  Presbyter  Knight  going  to  the 
warrs,  that  I  am  ashamed  of  it ;  and  by  and  by  meeting 
at  Mr.  Townsend's  at  dinner,  I  sold  it  to  him  for  18f?." 
On  the  6th  of  February,  however,  he  bought  it  again  :  "  it 
being  certainly  some  ill-humour  to  be  so  against  that  which 
all  the  world  cries  up  to  be  the  example  of  wit ;  for  which 
I  am  resolved  once  more  to  read  him  and  see  whether  I 
can  find  it  or  no."  Another  ientry,  December  10  of  the 
same  year,  1663,  mentions  a  visit  to  a  bookseller's,  when, 
by  the  way,  he  "  could  not  tell  whether  to  lay  out  my 
money  for  books  of  pleasure,  as  plays,  which  my  nature 
was  most  earnest  in  ;  but  at  last "  (and  this  list  is  certainly 
curious),  "after  seeing  Chaucer,  Dugdale's  'History  of 
Paul's,'  Stow's  'London,'  Gesner,  'History  of  Trent,'  be- 
sides Shakespeare,  Jonson  and  Beaumont's  plays,  I  at  last 
chose  Dr.  Fuller's  '  Worthies,'  the  '  Cabbala,  or  Collection 
of  Letters  of  State,  etc.,  etc.,'  and  '  Hudibras,'  both  parts, 
the  book  now  in  greatest  fashion  for  drollery,  though  I 
cannot,  I  confess,  see  enough  where  the  wit  lies."  In  gen- 
eral, as  Pepys  shows,  the  contrary  opinion  was  held. 
Every  one  looked  on  Butler's  fortune  as  made.  As  Dr. 
Johnson  puts  it,  "Every  eye  watched  for  the  golden 
shower  Avhich  Avas  to  fall  upon  the  author,  who  certainly 


English  Literature.  43 

was  not  without  his  part  in  the  general  expectation." 
Nothing  came  of  it.  The  golden  shower  was  as  decep- 
tive as  a  gold-mine,  and  Butler  took  up  his  pen  again. 
The  second  part  appeared,  and  Dr.  Johnson  repeats  a  story 
of  how  the  Duke  of  Buckingham  Avas  told  by  Wycherley 
that  Butler  deserved  well  of  the  royal  family,  and  "  that 
it  was  a  reproach  to  the  court  that  a  person  of  his  loyalty 
and  wit  should  suffer  in  obscurity  and  under  the  wants  he 
did."  The  duke  was  ready  with  his  promises,  and  offered 
to  let  the  poet  be  introduced  to  him.  While  he  was  wait- 
ing to  receive  the  poet,  "  a  brace  of  ladies  "  passed  by  the 
open  door,  and  the  duke  slipped  out,  and  Butler  never  saw 
him.  As  Colley  Gibber  said  of  him,*  "  Was  not  his  book 
always  in  the  pocket  of  his  prince  ?  And  what  did  the 
mighty  prowess  of  his  knight-errant  amount  to  ?  Why  f — 
he  died, with  the  highest  esteem  of  the  court — in  a  garret!" 
Cowley  was  promised  by  Charles  I.  and  Charles  II.  the 
mastership  of  the  Savoy — an  old  hospital  for  the  recep- 
tion of  professional  beggars — but  the  sinecure  was  never 
granted  him,  and  he  died  in  neglect. 

Writing  for  the  stage  was  not  very  satisfactory,  although 
it  "was  tried  by  nearly  all  the  writers  of  the  time.  Dry- 
den,  who  probably  was  paid  as  much  as  any  one,  received, 
apparently,  about  £100  a  year,  and  never  more  than  £100 
for  any  one  of  his  plays.  The  prologues  and  epilogues 
would  bring  him,  perhaps,  five  guineas  more.  For  a  time 
Dryden  received  from  £300  to  £400  in  return  for  writ- 
ing three  plays  a  year — and  that  is  the  equivalent  of  three 
times  as  much  at  the  present  time — and  he  had  pensions 
from  the  king,  but  the  reward  was  scanty  and  uncertain 
for  the  rest  of  the  dramatic  writers.  They  all  had  to  de- 
pend for  further  support  upon  such  gifts  as  they  might 

*  In  his  dedication  of  liis  "  Ximena  "  to  Steele, 
f  Proctor  calls  this  use  of  why  an  Americanism. 


44  English  Literature. 

entice  from  the  rich  by  complimentary  addresses,  odes, 
elegies,*  dedications,  etc.  In  a  word,  there  was  no  public. 
The  history  of  English  literature  for  the  next  hundred 
years  is  an  account  of  the  growth  of  a  reading  public. 

At  some  other  time  we  shall  discuss  briefly  some  of  the 
peculiarities  of  the  stage.  Of  certain  qualities  of  the  poe- 
try mention  has  been  already  made,  such  as  theJiiYasie^i, 
of  conceits  :  the  later  poets  were  satisfied  with  the  inge- 
nuity and  novelty  of  the  conceits  alone  ;  they  looked  upon 
the  means  as  an  end,  just  as,  possibly,  some  of  our  con- 
temporary verse-writers  mistake  the  use  of  new  and  rare 
epithets  as  all  that  is  required  for  poetry.  The  reacjtion 
was  in  favor  of  simplicity  and  correctness.  It  began,  as 
we  saw,  in  Denham  and  W  alfer,  who  are  to  some  extent 
the  English  equivalents  of  Malherbe,  but  Dryden  was  the 
man  who  left  his  mark  most  distinctly  upon  the  move- 
ment, until  we  come  to  Pope,  who  brought  it  to  its  high- 
est condition.  "^ 

il.  Possibly  the  most  characteristic  form  of  the  poetry 
^this  time  is  the  satirical.  There  was  an  absence  of  strong 
enthusiasm,  and  in  its  place  there  existed  political  heat, 
and,  above  all,  an  earnest  desire  for  correctness.  The 
wide-spread  licentiousness  of  the  age  produced  the  cyni- 
cism wliich  would  take  pleasure  in  the  study  of  the  faults 
of  mankind  rather  than  in  imaginative  representations  of 
human  excellence.  Moreover,  the  new-born  intellectual 
and  scientific  interest  demanded  what  was  thought  to  be 
accuracy.  It  must  be  remembered,  however,  that  satire 
was  not  absolutely  new  in  English  verse.  There  was 
George  Gascoigne's  "Steele  Glas,"  1576,  one  of  the  early 
poems  in  blank  verse,  by  the  way,  from  which  it  may  be 
allowable  to  quote  a  few  lines  (p.  78)  : 

*  Drvdcn  received  500  guineas  for  liis  elegy,  "  Eieonora,"  on  the  Countess 
of  Al)ins;don. 


English  Literature.  45 

"  Now  tliese  be  past,  (my  priests)  yet  shall  you  pray 
For  common  people  each  in  his  degree, 
That  God  vouchsafe  to  grant  them  all  his  grace. 
When  should  I  now  begin  to  bid  my  beads  ? 
Or  who  shall  first  be  put  in  common  place  ? 
My  wits  be  weary  and  my  eyes  are  dim, 
I  cannot  see  who  best  deserves  the  room. 
Stand  forth,  good  Piers,  thou  plowman  by  tliy  name, 
Yet  so,  the  sailor  saith  I  do  him  wrong : 
That  one  contends  his  pains  are  without  peer, 
That  other  saith  that  none  be  like  to  his  ; 
Indeed  they  labour  both  exceedingly. 
But  since  I  see  no  shipman  that  can  live 
Without  the  plough,  and  yet  I  many  see 
(Which  live  by  land)  that  never  saw  the  seas  : 
Therefore,  I  say,  stand  forth  Piers  Plowman  first 
Thou  winnest  the  room,  by  very  worthyness. 

Behold  him,  priests,  and  though  he  stink  of  sweat. 
Disdain  him  not :  for  shall  I  tell  you  what  ? 
Such  climb  to  heaven,  before  the  shaven  crowns. 
But  how  ?  forsooth  with  true  humility. 
Not  that  they  hoard  their  grain  when  it  is  cheap. 
Nor  that  they  kill  the  calf  to  have  the  milk. 
Nor  that  they  set  debate  between  their  lords," 

and  commit  various  agrarian  outrages. 

"  I  say  that  sooner  some  of  them 
Shall  scale  the  walls  which  lead  us  up  to  heaven 
Than  corn-fed  beasts,  whose  belly  is  their  God 
Although  they  preach  of  more  perfection." 

The  priests  are  also  to  pray  for  sailors — 

"  God  them  send 
More  mind  of  him  whenas  they  come  to  land — 
For  toward  shipwreck  many  men  can  pray." 
****** 
But  here,  methinks,  my  priests  begin  to  frown, 

****** 
And  one  I  hear  more  saucy  than  the  rest 
Which  asketh  me,  when  shall  our  prayers  end  ?" 


46  English  Literature. 

To  this  he  answers  : 

"  When  tinkers  make  no  more  holes  than  they  found, 

****** 
When  colliers  put  no  dust  into  their  sacks, 

****** 
When  smiths  shoe  horses  as  they  would  be  shod, 

****** 
When  brewers  put  no  baggage  in  their  beer. 

****** 
When  silver  sticks  not  on  the  teller's  fingers, 
And  when  receivers  pay  as  they  receive. 
When  all  these  folk  have  quite  forgotten  fraud." 

He  ends  the  poem  thus  : 

"  And  yet  therein  I  pray  you  (my  good  priests) 
Pray  still  for  me,  and  for  my  Glass  of  Steel 
That  it  (nor  I)  do  any  mind  offend, 
Because  we  show  all  colours  in  their  kind. 
And  pray  for  me  that  (since  my  hap  is  such 
To  see  men  so)  I  may  perceive  myself. 
0  worthy  words  to  end  my  worthless  verse, 
Pray  for  me,  priests,  I  pray  you  pray  for  rae." 

But  these  pensive  lines  are  very  different  from  the  usual 
somewhat  brazen  rhetoric  of  the  regular  satirical  poets  of 
England.  The  first*  of  these  was  Joseph  Hall  (1574- 
1656),  afterwards  Bishop  of  Exeter  and  of  Norwich.  At 
the  age  of  twenty -three,  and  while  he  was  yet  a  student  at 
Emmanuel  College,  Cambridge,  the  author  began  the  pub- 
lication of  his  Satires,  the  first  three  books  appearing  in 
1597,  the  last  three  in  1598,  a  little  more  than  twenty 
years  after  Gascoigne's  "  Steele  Glas." 

"  I  first  adventure,"  is  the  way  he  begins  : 

*  The  controversy  about  absolute  priority  would  be  sterile.  Grosart,  in 
the  preface  to  his  edition  of  Hall's  satires,  rules  out  Piers  Plowman  as  a 
mediaeval  writer,  and  mentions,  besides  Gascoigne,  Hake's  "  Xewes  out  of 
Powles  Church  Yard,"  1567-69,  and  Thomas  Lodge's  "Fig  for  Momus," 
1595.     What  Hall  meant  was  th.it  he  was  the  first  classical  satirist. 


English  Literature.  47 

"I  first  adventure,  with  fool-hardy  might, 
To  tread  the  steps  of  perilous  despite. 
I  first  adventure,  follow  me  who  list, 
And  be  the  second  English  satirist. 

****** 
Go,  daring  muse,  on  with  thy  thankless  task, 
And  do  the  ugly  face  of  Vice  unmask." 

And  this  he  did  with  the  vigor  he  learned  from  Juvenal 
and  the  "  Roman  ancients  " — "  Whose  words,"  he  says, 
"  were  short,  and  darksome  was  their  sense. 

Who  reads  one  line  of  their  harsh  poesies,. 

Thrice  must  he  take  his  wind,  and  breathe  him  thrice." 

Here  is  an  example  : 

"  Thy  grandsire's  words  savoured  of  thrifty  leeks 
Or  manly  garlic. 

They  naked  went,  or  clad  in  ruder  hide 
Or  home-spun  russet,  void  of  foreign  pride. 
But  thou  canst  sport  in  garish  gauderie. 
To  suit  a  fool's  far-fetched  livery. 
A  French  head  joined  to  neck  Italian  : 
The  thighs  from  Germany,  the  breast  from  Spain  : 
An  Englishman  in  none,  a  fool  in  all." 

This  reminds  one  of  Portia's  description  of  the  English 
lord,  "Merchant  of  Venice,"  I.  i.  79  (1596-7). 

He  attacks  Marlowe,  and,  in  fact,  most  of  his  contem- 
poraries : 

"  Too  popular  is  tragic  poesie. 
Straining  his  tiptoes  for  a  farthing  fee. 
And  doth,  beside,  on  rimeless  numbers  tread : 
Unbid  iambics  flow  from  careless  head." 

He  also  denounces  various  social  errors  : 

"  Who  ever  gives  a  pair  of  velvet  shoes 
To  th'  holy  rood,  or  liberally  allows 
But  a  new  rope  to  ring  the  curfew  bell, 
But  he  desires  that  his  great  deed  may  dwell 
Or  graven  in  the  chancel-window  glass, 
Or  in  the  lasting  tomb  of  plated  brass. 


48  English  Literature. 

Some  stately  tomb  he  builds,  Egyptian  wise, 
Rex  regnm  written  on  the  pyramis  : 
Whereas  great  Arthur  lives  in  ruder  oak, 
That  never  felt  aught  but  the  feller's  stroke, 
Small  honor  can  be  got  with  gaudy  grave, 
A  rotten  name  from  death  it  cannot  save. 
The  fairer  tomb,  the  fouler  is  thy  name, 
The  greater  pomp  procuring  greater  shame. 
Thy  monument  make  thou  thy  living  deeds, 
No  other  tomb  than  that  true  virtue  needs !" 

Sat.  ii.  lib.  iii. 

We  cannot  linger  long  over  these  poems.  They  were, 
perhaps,  the  first  attempts  in  English  at  adapting  ancient 
poetry  to  modern  times  ;  a  habit  which  was  forgotten, 
and  revived  by  Rochester  in  the  time  of  Charles  II.  It 
ran  through  the  last  century.  Hall  by  no  means  invent- 
ed the  notion  of  this  sort  of  satirical  writing,  although 
he  was  a  contemporary  of  the  French  manipulators  of 
Juvenal,  D'Aubigne  (1550-1630)  and  Regnier  (1573- 
1613)  ;  he  had  read  but  Ariosto's  satires  and  "one  base 
French  satire,"  *  which  had  inspired  him,  or  helped  to 

*  Vide  the  postscript  to  his  satires :  "  Besides  the  plain  experience  there- 
of in  the  satires  of  Ariosto  (save  which  and  one  base  French  satire)  I  could 
never  attain  the  view  of  any  for  my  direction."  He  probably  refers  to 
one  of  the  satyr-like  French  poems  of  the  early  part  of  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury, such  as  adorn  "  Le  Parnasse  Satyrique." 

The  satires  of  Ariosto  and  of  Alaraanni  were  doubtless  Wyatt's  model ; 
thus: 

"  This  [independence]  is  the  cause  that  I  could  never  yet 

Hang  on  their  sleeves  that  weigh,  as  thou  may'st  see, 

A  chip  of  chance  more  than  a  pound  of  wit. 

This  maketh  me  at  home  to  hunt  and  hawk ; 

And  in  foul  weather  at  my  book  to  sit ; 

In  frost  and  snow,  then  with  my  bow  to  stalk ; 

No  man  doth  mark  whereso  I  ride  or  go, 

In  lusty  leas  at  liberty  I  walk  ; 

And  of  these  news  I  feel  nor  weal  nor  woe." .  .  . 


English  Literature.  49 

inspire  him,  with  the  notion  of  modernizing  Juvenal.  Ari- 
osto's  satires  are  certainly  not  hitter  portrayals  of  the  dark 
side  of  life  in  Italy — for  he  had  a  field  which  would  have 
delio-hted  Juvenal  ;  they  lack  that  writer's  tremendous 
earnestness  ;  they  are  epistles,  and  are  more  like  Plorace's 
descriptions  of  what  he  saw.  That  there  should  have 
been  a  similarity  of  methods  among  the  writers  of  the 
Renaissance  in  modern  Europe  is  not  strange  in  view  of 
the  fact  that  light  came  to  them  from  but  one  quarter- 
namely,  from  antiquity.  Italy  was  the  first  to  study  the 
classics,  and  the  first  to  try  the  experiments  which  all  the 
rest  of  civilized  Europe  tried  in  turn. 

About  Hall  I  will  only  add  that  Milton,  who  had  a  con- 
troversy with  him,  denounced  his  "  hobbling  distick,"  as  he 
called  it,  in  his  "Apology  for  Smectymnuus;"*  that  Hall 
sank  into  obscurity  until  Pope's  time,  who  wished  that  he 
had  modernized  him,  as  he  did  modernize  some  of  Donne's 
satires,  and  that  he  was  much  admired  by  Gray.  I  think, 
however,  that  now  those  who  turn  back  to  him  feel  as  if 
he  was  more  impressed  by  a  desire  to  conform  to  Juvenal 
than  to  the  facts,  and  that  he  would  not  have  been  so  in- 
dignant if  the  Roman  poet  had  not  sho-ftTi  him  the  way. 
Donne's  satires  are  veiy  difi^erent.  He  wrote  them  when 
but  twenty,  and  they  seem  to  be  very  genuine  expressions 
of  real  feeling.     Here  is  one  passage  : 

"  Fool  and  wretch,  wilt  thou  let  Soul  be  tied 
To  men's  laws,  by  which  she  shall  not  be  tried 


*  "  Neither  had  I  read  the  hobbling  distick  which  he  means.  For  this 
good  hap  I  had  from  a  careful  education  to  be  inured  and  seasoned  be- 
times with  the  best  and  elegantest  authors  of  the  learned  tongues  and 
thereto  brought  an  ear  that  could  measure  a  just  cadence  and  scan  with- 
out articulating;  rather  nice  and  humorous  in  what  was  tolerable  then 
patient  to  read  every  drawling  versifier." 

3 


50  Engliah  Literature. 

At  the  last  day  ?     Oil,  will  it  then  serve  thee 

To  say  a  Philip  or  a  Gregory, 

A  Harry  or  a  Martin  taught  thee  this? 

Is  not  this  excuse  for  mere  contraries, 

Equally  strong  ?     Cannot  both  sides  say  so  ? 

That  thou  may'st  rightly  obey  Power,  her  bounds  know." 

After  the  Restoration  satire  naturally  had  abundance  of 
material.  Marvell  denounced  the  vices  of  the  court,  and, 
as  I  have  said,  Butler  jeered  at  the  Puritans.  I  think  that 
most  of  us  agree  with  Pepys,  and  find  "  Hudibras  "  tedi- 
ous, for,  as  Dr.  Johnson  said,  "  Our  grandfathers  knew 
the  picture  from  the  life  ;  we  judge  of  the  life  from  the 
picture,"  but  there  are  enough  clever  couplets  in  Butler 
to  keep  his  name  fresh  : 

"  The  greatest  saints  and  sinners  have  been  made 
Of  proselytes  of  one  another's  trade." 

"  The  subtler  all  things  are 
They're  but  to  nothing  the  more  near." 

"  Those  that  write  iu  rhyme  still  make 
The  one  verse  for  the  other's  sake." 

These  survive,  while  "Hudibras"  is  practi(^ally  unread. 
Cleveland  (1613-59),  too,  was  never  tired  of  ridiculing  the 
Puritans,  whom,  for  instance,  he  thus  describes: 

"  With  face  and  fashion  to  be  known 
For  one  of  sure  election. 
With  eyes  all  white  and  many  a  groan. 
With  neck  aside  to  draw  in  tone. 
With  harp  in's  nose,  or  he  is  none. 
See  a  new  teacher  of  the  town, 
0,  the  town,  the  town's  new  teacher" — 

and  Cleveland's  poems  doubtless  gave  hints  to  Butler. 
Butler,  too,  by  no  means  satirized  the  Puritans  alone  :  bad 
])oets  ;  the  "Royal  Society  ;  critics,  of  course  ;  the  age  oT 
Charles  TT.  ;  marriage;  ])lagiaries  —  all  came  in  for  his 
clever  ridicuU'  in  other  short  ])oems.      But  altlioiigh  many 


English  Litei'ature.  5 1 

of  Butler's  lines  have  become  proverbial,  and  his  wit  is  as 
epigrammatic  as  that  of  Pope,  he  failed  to  attain  a  really- 
high  2)Osition,  because  he  was  unable  to  see  anything  but 
what  was  contemptible  in  the  Puritans.  As  Mr.  Stopford 
Brooke  says  :  "  Satire  should  have  at  least  the  semblance 
of  truth  ;  yet  Butler  calls  the  Puritans  cowards."  And 
readers  know  that  perjietual  epigrams  become  in  time  as 
wearisome  as  perpetual  punning. 

Ill,  Satire,  then,  was  the  weapon  which,  so  to  speak, 
ruder  craftsmen  had  been  forging,  and  Dryden  was  about 
to  polish  for  the  consternation  of  his  foes.  In  his  early 
days  he  was  a  busy  writer  for  the  stage,  but  of  the  drama, 
and  of  his  contribution  to  it,  we  shall  speak  at  another 
time.  His  satirical  poems,  at  least  certain  parts  of  them, 
are  what  have  made  him  famous  and  will  keep  him  fa- 
mous. Had  he  died  at  the  age  of  forty,  we  should  have 
kno^\Ti  him  as,  all  things  considered,  a  clever  dramatist  and 
an  intelligent  critic,  whose  prefaces  and  brief  prose  writ- 
ings were  worthy  of  attention.  Davenant  had  been  poet- 
laureate  to  .Charles  I.,  and  was  reappointed  to  the  same 
position  by  Charles  II. ;  at  his  death  it  must  have  seemed 
that  Butler  was  the  pi-oper  man  to  succeed  him,  but  Dry- 
den was  appointed.  His  first  great  work  was  "Absalom 
and  Achitophel,"  published  in  November,  1681.  And  it 
is  with  this  poem  that  Dryden  first  showed  how  formida- 
ble an  antagonist  he  was.  Dryden  wrote  to  defend  the 
king.  Moreover,  he  had  an  opportunity,  which  he  did  not 
neglect,  of  paying  off  some  of  his  own  personal  scores,  one, 
of  long  standing,  being  an  account  with  the  Duke  of  Buck- 
ingham, who  had  ridiculed  him,  with  more  success  than 
lasting  wit,  in  the  "  Rehearsal."  There  were  others,  too, 
who  came  in  for  incidental  notice,  yet  these  debts  he  paid 
without  any  exhibition  of  the  malice  that  would  have 
taken  the  stingr  from  his  lash. 


52  English  Literature. 

He  describes  Shaftesbury  thus  : 

"  Of  these  the  false  Achitophel  was  first ; 
A  name  to  all  succeeding  ages  cursed : 
For  close  designs,  and  crooked  counsels  fit ; 
Sagacious,  bold,  and  turbulent  of  wit ; 
Restless,  unfix'd  in  principles  and  place ; 
In  power  unpleased,  impatient  of  disgrace  : 
A  fiery  soul,  which  working  out  its  way, 
Fretted  the  pigmy  body  to  decay. 
And  o'er-informed  the  tenement  of  clay. 
A  daring  pilot  in  extremity ; 

rieased  with  the  danger,  when  the  waves  went  high 
He  sought  the  storms ;  but  for  a  calm  unfit ! 
Would  steer  too  nigh  the  sands  to  boast  his  wit. 
Great  wits  are  sure  to  madness  near  allied. 
And  thin  partitions  do  their  bounds  divide. 
How  safe  is  treason,  and  how  sacred  ill, 
Where  none  can  sin  against  the  people's  will ! 
Where  crowds  can  wink,  and  no  offence  be  known, 
Since  in  another's  guilt  they  find  their  own  ! 
Yet  fame  deserved  no  enemy  can  grudge  ; 
The  statesman  we  abhor,  but  praise  the  judge. 
In  Israel's  courts  ne'er  sat  an  Abethdin 
With  more  discerning  eyes,  or  hands  more  clean, 
Unbribed,  unsought,  the  wretched  to  redress ; 
Swift  of  despatch,  and  easy  of  access. 
Oh  !  had  he  been  content  to  serve  the  crown, 
With  virtues  only  proper  to  the  gown ; 
Or  had  the  rankness  of  the  soil  been  freed 
From  cockle  that  oppressed  the  noble  seed ; 
David  for  him  his  tuneful  harp  had  strung. 
And  heaven  had  wanted  one  immortal  song. 
But  wild  ambition  loves  to  slide,  not  stand. 
And  fortune's  ice  prefers,  not  virtue's  land." 

J<vgry  one  will  R()tAc-.e,  the  eyjdenttru^  of  this 

compact  description,  and  the  absence  of  personal  feeling  ; 
merits  which  are  always  rare  in  controversial  writing,  and 
especially  rare  at  this  time.     And  it  is  equally  impossible 


I^nyliak  Literature.  53 

to  overlook  the  unprecedented  ease  and  grace  with  which 
the  heroic  measure  is  handled.  Notice  this  passage,  too, 
in  which  Buckingham  is  described  : 

"  Some  of  their  chiefs  were  princes  of  the  land ; 
In  the  first  ranli  of  these  did  Zimri  stand ; 
A  man  so  various  that  he  seemed  to  be 
Not  one,  but  all  mankind's  epitome : 
Stiff  in  opinion,  always  in  the  wrong ; 
Was  everything  by  starts,  and  nothing  long ; 
But  in  the  course  of  one  revolving  moon, 
Was  chyraist,  fiddler,  statesman,  and  buffoon : 
Then  all  for  women,  painting,  rhyming,  drinking, 
Besides  ten  thousand  freaks  that  died  in  thinking. 
Blest  madman,  that  could  every  hour  employ, 
With  something  new  to  wish,  or  to  enjoy: 
Railing  and  praising  were  his  usual  themes ; 
And  both,  to  show  his  judgment,  in  extremes  : 
So  over  violent,  or  over  civil, 
That  every  man  with  him  was  God  or  Devil. 
In  squandering  wealth  was  his  peculiar  ait : 
Nothing  went  unrewarded  but  desert. 
Beggared  by  fools,  whom  still  he  found  too  late. 
He  had  his  jest,  and  they  had  his  estate. 
He  laughed  himself  from  court ;  then  sought  relief 
By  forming  parties,  but  could  ne'er  be  chief : 
For  spite  of  him,  the  weight  of  business  fell 
On  Absalom  and  wise  Achitophel ; 
Thus  wicked  but  in  will,  of  means  bereft. 
He  left  not  faction,  but  of  that  was  left." 

Here  is  tlie  same  nn('xagL;-orated  description,  this  time 
of  a  flimsy  cliaracter,  and  it  is  easy  to  imagine  the  force 
with  Avhic-li  the  poem  must  have  impi-essed  itself  upon  its 
readers.  As  for  the  mere  sound,  the  above  may  be  com- 
pared with  these  lines  of  Rochester's  : 

"  Well,  sir,  'tis  granted  :  I  said  Dryden's  rhymes 
Were  stolen,  unequal — nay  dull,  many  times. 
What  foolish  patron  is  there  found  of  his 
So  blindly  partial  to  deny  me  this  ? 


54  Diylls/t  Literature. 

But  that  his  plays  embroidered  up  and  down 

With  wit  and  learning,  justly  pleased  the  town, 

In  the  same  paper  I  as  freely  own. 

Yet,  having  this  allowed,  the  heavy  mass 

That  stuffs  up  his  loose  volumes  must  not  pass." 

Or  these  from  Oldham  (1653-83)   (from  a  satire  in  which 
Spenser  is  dissuading  Oldham  from  poetry)  : 

"  I  come,  fond  Idiot,  ere  it  be  too  late, 
Kindly  to  warn  thee  of  thy  wretched  fate : 
Take  heed  betimes,  repent  and  learn  of  me 
To  shun  the  dang'rous  rocks  of  Poetry: 
Had  I  the  choice  of  Flesh  and  Blood  again, 
To  act  once  more  in  Life's  tumultuous  scene ; 
I'd  be  a  Porter  or  a  Scavenger, 
A  Groom,  or  anything  but  a  Poet  here : 
Hast  thou  observed  some  Hawker  of  tiie  Town, 
Cries  Matches,  Small  coal,  Brooms,  Old  shoes  and  boots, 
Socks,  Sermons,  Ballads,  Lies,  Gazettes,  and  Votes  ? 
So  unrecorded  to  the  grave  I'd  go."  .  .  . 

Surely  Dryden's  superior  management  of  the  heroic 
verse  is^Hileat  ait  once.  And  it  is  to  be  noticed  that  he 
does  not  confine  himself  to  what  Mr.  Lowell  calls  the 
"  thought  coop  "  of  the  couplet.  The  sense  runs  through 
from  one  line  to  another.  Yet  he  did  this  without  awk- 
wardness. Another  q^uality  that  he  had  was  that  of  rea- 
soning in  yerse,  of  making  statements  or  arguments  as 
clear  as  his  own  prose — and  that  is  saying  a  good  deal. 

This  Dryden  did  without  the  fierce  fury  of  most  of  the 
sadrists,  a  (j^uality  which  they  copied  from  Juvenal,  just  as 
-they  imitated  his  obscurity  and  that  of  Persius.  He  wrote^ 
too,  with  complete  self-possession,  a  sort  of  lordly  superi- 
ority to  personal  pique,  as  when  he  s2)eaks  of  one  Samuel 
Johnson  as  Ben-Jochanan  : 

"  A  Jew  of  humble  parentage  was  he, 
Bv  trade  a  Levitc  though  of  low  degree : 


English  Literature.  55 

His  pride  uo  higher  than  the  desk  aspired. 
But  for  the  drudgery  of  priests  was  hired 
To  read  and  pray  in  linen  ephod  brave, 
And  pick  up  single  shekels  from  the  grave. 
Married  at  last,  but  finding  charge  come  faster, 
He  could  not  live  by  God,  but  changed  his  master, 
Inspired  by  want,  was  made  a  factious  tool ; 
They  got  a  villain,  and  we  lost  a  fool." 

Or  his  cool  reference  to  Pordage  :* 

"  Lame  Mephibosheth,  the  wizard's  son." 

In  1681  appeared  "  The  Medal,"  a  satire  against  sedition; 
ajnedal  having  been  struck  off  to  celebrate  Shaftesbury's 
acquittal  of  the  charge  of  high-treason. 

Let  us  consider  for  a  moment  the  circumstances  in  which 
these  poems  were  read.  In^  thejcit^there  were  numberless 
coffee-houses,  which  were  frequented  by  men  of  all  sorts 
_f or  the  discussion  of  political,  social,  and  literary  news  ; 
but^inthe  country  there  were  but  few  opportunities  of 
knowing  what  was  going  t)n.  The  gazettes  published  only 
what  the  licensers  of  the  press  allowed,  and  they  naturally 
did  not  contain  much  of  the  talk  of  the  town.  The  curi- 
osity of  the  provinces  was  allayed,  however,  by  men  who 
made  a 'business  of  writing  news-letters  to  certain  persons 
of  the  nobility,  clergymen,  magistrates,  or  what  not.  The 
writers- wandered  through  the  town,  picking  uj)  scraps  of 
news  for  their  correspondents.  Their  method  may  be 
learned  from  No.  625  of  the  Spectator,  in  which  a  writer 
says  :  "  In  order  to  make  myself  useful,  I  am  early  in  the 

*  Pordage's  father  had  been  expelled  his  charge  for  insufficiency.  One 
count  in  the  accusation  brought  against  him  was  this :  "  That  a  great 
dragon  came  into  his  chamber  with  a  tail  of  eight  yards  long,  four  great 
teeth,  and  did  spit  fire  at  him ;  and  that  he  contended  with  him ;"  vide 
Scott's  "  Life  of  Dryden,"  chap.  v.  Apparently  it  was  not  thought  etiquette 
to  contend  with  dragons. 


56  Emjllah  Literature. 

antiehamber,  where  I  thrust  my  head  into  the  thick  of  the 
press,  and  catch  the  news,  at  the  opening  of  the  door,  while 
it  is  warm.  Sometimes  I  stand  by  the  beefeaters,  and  take 
the  buzz  as  it  passes  by  me.  At  other  times  I  lay  my  ear 
close  to  the  wall,  and  suck  in  many  a  valuable  whisper,  as  it 
runs  in  a  straight  line  from  corner  to  corner.  When  I  am 
weary  of  standing,  I  repair  to  one  of  the  neighbouring  cof- 
fee-houses, .  . .  and  forestall  the  evening  post  by  two  hours. 
There  is  a  certain  gentleman  who  hath  given  me  the  slip. 
.  .  .  But  I  have  i>layed  him  a  trick.  I  have  purchased  a 
pair  of  the  best  coach-horses  I  could  buy  for  money,  and 
now  let  him  outstrip  me  if  he  can."  Thus  we  see  that  the 
energy  of  reporters  is  not  an  invention  of  the  nineteenth 
century. 

The  poorer  people  of  the  country  received  their  infor- 
mation of  what  was  going  on  in  the  city  from  the  clergy- 
nian,  with  such  comments,  words  of  exjilanation,  warning, 
and  advice  as  they  thought  proper ;  and,  since  the  clergy 
belonged  to  the  king's  party,  they  doubtless  took  every 
precaution  to  disseminate  what  they  deemed  sound  views. 

As  to  the  dissenters,  they  were  the  great  readers  oFser- 
mons  and  tracts,  and  how  numerous  these  were  may  be 
gathered  from  the  list  at  the  beginning  of  this  chapter. 
Preaching  was  generally  forbidden  them,  and  the  songs  of 
the  time  are  full  of  ribald  abuse  of  their  conventicles,  as 
their  secret  reunions  were  called.  They  were  exposed  to 
severe  persecution.  Pepys,  August  7,  1664,  says  :  "  I  saw" 
several  poor  creatures  carried  by,  by  constables,  for  being 
at  a  conventicle.  They  go  like  lambs,  without  any  resist- 
ance. I  w^ould  to  God,"  he  adds,  "  they  would  either  con- 
form, or  be  more  wise  and  not  be  catched."  Of  their 
sufferings  it  is  easy  to  judge  from  reading  any  life  of 
Bunyan.  Being  debarred  from  preaching,  they  took  to 
writing,  and  there  are  many  proofs  of  their  literary  activ- 


English  Literature.  5/ 

ity.  By  the  side  of  the  Pindaric  odes,  the  translations, 
the  ribaki  plays,  the  fierce  satires  of  the  reign  of  Charles 
II.,  there  were  appearing  a  host  of  religious  publications, 
of  which  the  best  known,  because  the  best  in  every  way, 
was  Bunyan's  "  Pilgrim's  Progress,"*  which  went  through 
eight  editions  in  four  years. 

Dryden  was  peculiarly  hi'.ppy  in  choosing  his  method  of 
attack.  Nowadays,  practised  readers  are  weary  of  fables 
and  allegories  ;  but  these  always  have  a  charm  for  children, 
and  for  inexperienced  readers,  who  need  this  sugaring  of 
the  pill,  or,  as  Addison  put  it  {^Spectator,  No.  512)  :  "This 
natural  pride  and  ambition  of  the  soul  is  very  much  grati- 
fied in  the  reading  of  a  fable  ;  for  in  writings  of  this  kind 
the  reader  comes  in  for  half  of  the  performance,  everything 
appears  to  him  like  a  discovery  of  his  own.  .  .  .  For  this 
reason  the  "  Absalom  and  Achitophel  "  w^as  one  of  the  most 
popular  poems  that  ever  appeared  in  English."  Then  a  bib- 
lical allegory  was  most  fortunate.  Dryden  stole  the  very 
thunder  of  the  Puritans  :  Zimri,  Shimei,  Ishbosheth,  Jebu- 
^eSj^  Barzillai — t]aese  names  alone  would  have  sanctified 
anv  writing. 

Not  only,  however,  was^  it  customary  to  transfer  current 
themes  to  a  biblicjil  setting,  as  indeed  had  been  done  in 
"  Samson  Agonistes  " — for  the  translation  of  the  Bible  had 
brought  about  a  chanei;e  somethino;  like  that  of  the  Renais- 


sance— but  the  very  naiues  of  the  poem  had  been  applied 

*  Foi-  the  origin  of  this  book,  see  "  The  Ancient  Poem  of  Guillaume 
de  Guileville,  entitled  Le  Pelerinage  de  rHomme,  compared  with  the 
Pilgrim's  Progress  of  John  Bunyan.  Edited  from  Notes  collected  by  the 
late  Mr.  Nathaniel  Hill.  London :  Basil  Montague  Pickering.  1858."  It 
is  much  to  be  regretted  that  the  editor  did  not  publish  the  notes  in  full. 
Cf.  prefaces  of  Southey  and  James  Montgomery  to  their  editions  of  this 
book,  and  the  interesting  but  uncritical  remarks  of  George  Offor  in  his  re- 
print, London,  1847. 

3* 


58  English  Literature. 

as  they  were  here.  There  was,  for  instance,  a  play  pub- 
lished in  1680,  "Absalom's  Conspiracy  ;  or,  the  Tragedy 
of  Treason,"  *  in  which  Monmouth  had  been  compared  to 
Absalom. 

While  in  this  satire  Dry  den  held  hi^hand,  and  by  his 
reasonableness  disarmed  opposition,  he  was  not  always  gen- 
tle with  stupidity.  In  the  second  part,  as  it  is  called,  of 
"  Absalom  and  Achitophel,"  after  many  replies  from  vari- 
ous Whig  poets,  he  reserved  some  of  the  writers  for  his 
own  castigation  :  as  in  the  line  about  Pordage,  and  the 
celebrated  attacks  on  Settle  and  Shadwell.  Kahum  Tate 
wrote  the  rest,  but  Dryden  inserted  a  few  most  cutting 
passages.  Shadwell  he  had  attacked  in  "  Mac  Flecknoe," 
in  October,  1682,  and  the  second  part  of  "Absalom  and 
Achitophel"  contained  denunciations  of  both  him  and 
Settle.  There  were  sufficient  reasons.  Shadwell  had  at- 
tacked him  in  an  incredibly  coarse  way  for  writing  the 
"Medal.".  And,  although  there  is  much  that  is  unquot- 
able in  Dryden's  satirical  verse,  that  fault  is  to  be  put 
down  to  the  time  in  which  he  lived  rather  than  to  his  own 
discredit.  He  was  decorum  itself  by  the  side  of  Shadwell, 
and,  even  when  he  is  most  violent  in  his  reply,  he  has  an 
air  of  good-natured  superiority  to  his  foes  which  must 
have  galled  them  as  much  as  it  may  amuse  us.  His  own 
views  on  Satire  were  most  reasonable,  as  he  said  in  his 
"  Essay  on  Satire  " — the  preface  f  to  the  translation  of 

*  Mentioned  by  Beljame. 

f  The  long  prefaces  were  not,  as  Swift  said  of  Dryden's,  in  his  lines 
"On  Poetry,  a  Rhapsody," 

"  Merely  writ  at  first  for  filling, 

To  raise  the  volume's  price  a  shilling  " 

(and  sec  also  "  A  Tale  of  a  Tul),"  sec.  v.),  but  rather  because  there  was  no 

other  means  of  reaching  the  public.     Then,  too,  there  was  the  precedent 

of  the  French  usage.     Thus  Boileau,  in  his  second  preface,  ed.  1G74  (Vic- 


Englhli  Literature.  59 

Juvenal  and  Persius.  "  How  easy  it  is  to  call  rogue  and 
villain,  and  that  wittily  !  but  how  hard  to  make  a  man 
appear  a  fool,  a  blockhead,  or  a  knave,  without  using  any 
of  those  opprobrious  terms  !  .  .  .  This  is  the  mystery  of 
that  noble  trade.  .  .  .  Neither  is  it  true  that  this  fineness 
of  raillery  is  offensive  ;  a  witty  man  is  tickled  while  he  is 
hurt  in  this  manner,  and  a  fool  feels  it  not.  .  .  .  There  is  a 
vast  difference  between  the  slovenly  butchering  of  a  man, 
and  the  fineness  of  a  stroke  that  separates  the  head  from 
the  body,  and  leaves  it  standing  in  its  place.  A  man  may 
be  capable,  as  Jack  Ketch's  wife  said  of  his  servant,  of  a 
plain  piece  of  work,  of  a  bare  hanging  :  but  to  make  a 
malefactor  die  sweetly  was  only  belonging  to  her  husband. 
I  wish  I  could  apply  it  to  myself,  if  the  reader  would  be 
kind  enough  to  think  it  belongs  to  me.  The  character  of 
Zimri  in  my  '  Absalom  '  is,  in  my  oj^inion,  worth  the  whole 
poem.  It  is  not  bloody,  but  it  is  ridiculous  enough,  and 
he  for  whom  it  was  intended  was  too  witty  to  resent  it  as 
an  injury.-.  .  .  I  avoided  the  mention  of  great  crimes,  and 
applied  myself  to  the  representing  of  blind  sides  and  little 
extravagances,  to  which,  the  wittier  a  man  is,  he  is  gener- 
ally the  more  obnoxious." 

Yet,  as  he  says  elsewhere  in  the  same  essay  :  "  Good 
sense  and  good  nature  are  never  separated,  though  the 
ignorant  world  has  thought  otherwise.  Good-nature,  by 
which  I  mean  beneficence  and  candor,  is  the  product  of 
right  reason,  which  of  necessity  will  give  allowance  to  the 
failings  of  others,  by  considering  that  there  is  nothing  per- 
fect in  mankind."  Personal  satire  will  always  seem  to  be 
the  result  of  ill-nature,  and  the  world  will  in  time  become 

tor  le  Due's  ed.,  p.  28):  "  J'avois  medite  une  assez  longue  preface,  ou, 
t^uivant  la  coutume  recjue  parmi  les  ecrivains  de  ce  temps,  j'esperois  ren- 
dre  un  compte  fort  exact  de  mes  ouvrages,  et  justifier  les  liberies  que  j'ai 
prises." 


6o  English  Literature. 

indifferent  to  denunciations,  however  brilliant,  when  the 
inspiring  causes  have  to  be  found  out  by  remote  investi- 
gation. We  all  have  our  own  quarrels  in  our  hands  ;  we 
are  concerned  with  new  forms  of  folly,  and  we  are  cold  to 
Dryden's  attacks  on  forgotten  writers  like  Settle,  or  Pope's 
venomous  abuse  in  the  "  Dunciad."  Only  those  things  live 
that  are  of  universal  application.  Poetry,  it  has  been  said, 
treats  of  those  qiialities  that  are  eternal  in  man,  and  the 
peculiar  qualities  of  Settle  and  Shadwell  are  fortunately 
obsolete.  At  the  end  of  the  last  century.  Dr.  Joseph 
Warton  said  that  it  was  an  undoubted  fact  that  the  "  Ab- 
salom and  Achitophel,"  which  is  far  from  being  a  virulent 
satire,  was  then  but  little  read,  and  that  the  "Dunciad" 
began  to  be  neglected.  Yet,  while  we  have  gi-own  in- 
different to  the  sum  of  Dryden's  satirical  poems,  we  can 
never  become  tired  of  certain  bits  in  which  personality 
fades  away  in  comparison  with  the  excellence  of  his  wit, 
as  in  the  lines  about  Burnet,  "  Hind  and  Panther,"  2477  : 

"  Prompt  to  assail,  and  careless  of  defence, 
Invulnerable  in  his  impudence, 
lie  dares  tlie  world,  and  eager  of  a  name, 
He  thrusts  about  and  justles  into  fame. 

***** 
So  fond  of  loud  report  that,  not  to  miss 
Of  being  known  (his  last  and  utmost  bliss) 
He  rather  would  be  known  for  what  he  is." 

Nothing  could  be  better  than  the  last  line,  which  is  all 
the  more  intensified  by  coming  at  the  end  of  a  triplet. 
When  we  come  to  Pope's  "  Dunciad,"  we  shall  see  how 
seldom  the  later  poet  gives  us  the  whole  character  of  a 
man,  which  Dryden  never  fails  to  do. 

Of  Dryden's  other  poems  I  shall  speak  but  briefly  ;  the 
*'  Religio  Laici,"  1681,  and  the  "Hind  and  the  Panther," 
1687,  were  in  many  ways  wonderful  poems.     Take  a  few 


English  Literature.  6i 

■lines  of  the  "  Religio  Laici,"  for  example,  and  we  shall 
find  Dry  den's  unfailing  dexterity  and  wit  : 

"  The  unlettered  Christian  who  believes  in  gross, 
Plods  on  to  heaven,  and  ne'er  is  at  a  loss  : 
For  the  strait  gate  would  be  made  straiter  yet 
Were  none  admitted  there  but  men  of  wit." 

In  the  early__W()rk  he  defends  Ti-otcstantisni  against 
atheismjjjulJieresy.  In  the  "Hind  and  the  Panther"  he 
writes  in  defence  of  the  Roman  Church,  of  which  he  had 
recently  become  a  member,  and  the  genuineness  of  his  re- 
ligious fervor  has  been  often  questioned.  This  is  a  ques- 
tion that  falls  outside  of  our  present  discussion,  but  it 
may  be  worth  while  to  point  out  some  of  the  inconsisten- 
cies with  which  he  has  been  charged.  Certainly,  Dryden 
seemed  in  earnest  when  he  attacked  "  the  bloody  bear,  an 
independent  beast,"  "the  buffoon  ape"  (the  atheists), 
"  the  bristled  Baptist  boar,"  "  False  Reynard"  (the  Arians 
and  Socinians),  "the  insatiate  Wolf  "  (the  Presbyterians). 
Yet  it  was  remembered  that  he  had  already  written  on 
the  other  side  of  the  religious  controversy.  In  "  Absalom 
and  Achitophel,"  he  had  spoken  coarsely  of  the  doctrine 
of  transubstantiation.  In  his  "Spanish  Friar,"  1081,  he 
ridiculed  processions,  the  invocation  of  saints,  and  auric- 
ular confession.  In  lii^  "IJcligio  Laid,"'  lie  attacked  the 
Chiivcli  of  KuiuG,;  in  his  "  Duke  of  Guise,"  wi'itten  in  con- 
junction with  Xat  Lee,  he  defended  a  Catholic  prince,  and 
after  the  death  of  Charles  II.,  when  a  Catholic  king  was  on 
the  throne,  he  wrote  the  "  Hind  and  the  Panther,"  in  which 
he  began  by  inviting  the  Church  of  England  to  unite  with 
that  of  Rome,  and  ended  by  urging  the  dissenters  to  make 
common  cause  with  Rome  against  the  Church  of  England. 

In  politics  he  showed  the  same  fickleness.  In  "  Am- 
boyna,"  he  tried  to  stir  up  the  English  against  the  Dutch; 
in  his  "  Absalom  and  Achitophel,"  and  the  "  Medal,"  he 


62  EnglisJi  Literature. 

blamed  Sliaites!)iiry  for  encouraging  that  war.  In  liter- 
ary matters,  as,  about  the  use  of  prose  or  verse  in  his  plays, 
he  was  forever  wavering.  Another  charge  is  brought, 
that  he  flattered  the  Duke  and  Duchess  of  Monmouth, 
who  protected  him  in  his  need,  and  then  that  he  abused 
them  in  "Absalom  and  Achitophel,"  and  drew  the  infa- 
mous Duke  of  Guise,  in  the  play  of  that  name,  from  the 
Duke  of  Monmouth. 

Let  us  remember,  however,  the  almost  universal  corrup- 
tion of  the  time,  and  in  special  defence  of  Drydcn  the  fact 
that,  great  poet  as  he  was,  he  wrote  mainly  as  a  journalist, 
so  to  speak.  In  the  absence  of  other  ways  of  reaching  the 
public,  his  poems  were  written  to  order  for  direct,  imme- 
diate political  effect,  and  with  the  same  unscrupulousness 
that  is  sometimes  seen  in  a  corrupt  press.  This  by  no 
means  frees  his  conduct  from  blame,  but  it  may  possibly 
be  in  part  an  explanation. 

As  I  say,  I  pass  over  these  poems  with  some  celerity, 
because  we  now  take  very  little  interest  in  the  theological 
questions  which  were  meat  and  drink  to  our  ancestors  in 
the  seventeenth  century,  and  the  poems  are  in  the  main 
dead.  They  are  ingenious  pamphlets  in  verse,  and  they 
doubtless  set  the  fUshion  for  the  many  didactic  and  theo- 
logical poems  which  weighed  down  the  literature  of  the 
eighteenth  century.  They  deserve  the  credit,  however,  of 
being  about  the  best  of  their  kind  :  The  "  Mac  Fleck- 
noe,"  in  which  a  wretched  Irish  poet,  one  Flecknoe,  makes 
over  the  succession  to  Shadwell,  is  short,  and  will  well  re- 
pay attention.  It  has  the  great  merit  of  being  the  one  of 
the  controversial  poems  of  the  time  that  is  most  nearly 
readable.  The  French  influence,  which  Dry  den,  a  thorough 
Englishman,  was  helping  to  introduce,  had  at  least  a  molli- 
fying influence  on  this  kind  of  writing.  The  beginning, 
familiar  as  it  is,  will  show  this  : 


English  Literature.  63 

"All  human  things  ar^  subject  to  decay, 
And,  when  fate  summons,  monarchs  must  oblige  ; 
Tills  Flecknoe  found,  who,  like  Augustus,  young 
Was  called  to  empire,  and  had  governed  long; 
In  prose  and  verse  was  owned  without  dispute, 
Through  all  the  realms  of  Nonsense,  absolute. 
This  aged  prince,  now  flourishing  in  peace, 
And  blessed  with  issue  of  a  large  increase, 
Worn  out  with  business,  did  at  length  debate 
To  settle  the  succession  of  the  state ; 
And  pondering  which  of  all  his  sons  was  lit 
To  reign,  and  wage  immortal  war  with  wit. 
Cried,  '  'Tis  resolved  !  for  nature  pleads,  that  he 
Should  only  rule  who  most  resemlales  me. 
Sliadwell  alone  my  perfect  image  bears, 
Mature  in  dulness  from  his  tender  years ; 
Sliadwell  alone,  of  all  my  sons,  is  he 
Who  stands  confirmed  in  full  stupidity. 
The  rest  to  some  faint  meaning  make  pretence, 
But  Shadwell  never  deviates  into  sense. 
Some  beams  of  wit  on  other  souls  may  fall. 
Strike  through  and  make  a  lucid  interval ; 
But  Shadwell's  genuine  night  admits  no  ray, 
His  rising  fogs  prevail  upon  the  day. 
Besides,  his  goodly  fabric  fills  the  eye, 
And  seems  designed  for  thoughtless  naajesty ; 
Thoughtless  as  monarch  oaks,  that  shade  the  plain, 
And,  spread  in  solemn  state,  supinely  reign.'  " 

This  mock-heroic  is  sometimes  called  an  imitation  of 
Boileau's  famous  jjoem,  "Le  Lutrin,"  which  appeared  in 
1674.  In  the  French  poem,  certain  ecclesiastics  are  turned 
into  ridicule,  just  as  is  done  with  the  literary  adventurer  in 
the  English  one.  Yet  we  have  Dryden's  statement  that 
the  resemblance  was  accidental.*     At  any  rate,  the  "  Mac 

*  Some  time  later,  Dryden  said  in  conversation,  "  If  anything  of  mii.e 
is  good,  'tis  my  '  Mac  Flecknoe,'  and  I  value  myself  the  more  on  it,  because 
'tis  the  first  piece  of  ridicule  written  in  heroics."     His  interlocutor  vent- 


64  Ei\gli8h  Literature. 

Flecknoe  "  has  the  merit  of  brevity,  and  is  not  dull.  The 
"  Religio  Laici  "  is  dull,  and  as  to  the  "  Hind  and  the  Pan- 
ther," I  think  that  there  must  be  few  people  who  can  care 
much  for  the  theological  discussions  of  those  two  beasts. 
The  long  controversy  on  the  Test  Acts,  the  authority  of 
the  pope,  tran substantiation,  etc.,  are  most  unfortunately 
set. 

These  extracts  will  serve  to  show  what  was  the  principle 
which  Dryden,  by  precept  and  example,  fastened  on  Eng- 
lish literature.  We  will  not  foi-get  that  it  was  not  of  his 
invention,  nor  yet  necessarily  what  he  most  admired.  He 
had  a  warm  feeling  of  reverence  for  Milton,  and  it  is  wor- 
thy of  note  that  in  1688  there  appeared  a  new  edition  of 
Milton,  published  by  subscription,  and  that  from  this  time 
that  poet  began  to  receive  general  admiration.  At  least, 
he  was  no  longer  overlooked.  But  in  the  new  and  swift 
advance  towards  our  modern  civilization  exaggerated 
weight  was  laid  on  the  external  tokens  of  this  civilization. 
While  England  was  ready  for  the  change,  the  French  were 
busy  in  laying  down  the  laws  for  its  control  in  literature. 
Instead  of  lawlessness,  polish  ;  instead  of  blank  verse, 
rhymej  above  all  things^  elegance.  We,  who  are  the  liv- 
ing witnesses  of  a  somewhat  similar  revolution  in  taste, 
may  readily  understand  how  much  more  powerful  than 
statute  laws  are  new  aesthetic  rules.  Probably  even  Nihi- 
lists love,  or  try  to  love,  dados  and  friezes  ;  and  we  at 
once  suspect  the  sincerity  of  any  person  who  avows  a  lik- 
ing for  white  paint  and  green  blinds.  Similar  forces  were 
then  at  work  in  England  to  ruin  any  admiration  for  the 
great  tragedians.    They  were  looked  upon  as  men  of  ability, 

ured  to  remind  the  poet  of  Boileau's  "  Lutrin,"  wliicli  Dryden  Sciid  he 
had  read,  but  had  forf:^otten,  and  that  he  had  not  copied  it.  In  Italian, 
too,  a  number  of  mock-heroics  liad  been  written. 


English  Literature.  65 

who  lacked  that  for  which  the  modern  equivalent  is  cult- 
ure. They  were  void  of  art,  and  art  was  the  shibboleth 
of  that  age.  As  Dryden  wrote  to  his  "  dear  friend,  Mi\ 
Congreve,  on  his  comedy  called  'The  Double  Dealer:'  " 

"  Well,  then,  the  promised  hour  has  come  at  last, 
The  present  age  of  wit  obscures  the  past : 
Strong  were  our  sires,  and  as  they  fought  they  writ, 
Conquering  with  force  of  arm,  and  dint  of  wit ; 
Theirs  was  the  giant  race  before  the  flood ; 
And  thus  when  Charles  returned,  our  empire  stood. 
Like  James,  he  the  stubborn  soil  manured. 
With  rules  of  husbandry  the  rankness  cured  ; 
Tamed  us  to  manners,  when  the  stage  was  rude, 
And  boisterous  English  wit  with  art  endued. 
Our  age  was  cultivated  thus  at  length, 
But  what  we  gain'd  in  skill,  we  lost  in  strength. 
Our  builders  were  with  want  of  genius  curst ; 
The  second  temple  was  not  like  the  first. 
Till  you,  the  best  Vitruvius,  came  at  length, 
Our  beauties  equal,  but  excel  our  strength." 

When  we  come  to  speak  of  the  plays,  we  shall  see  how 
the  work  of  the  early  writers  was  regarded  and  treated. 
What  was  thought  in  the  last  century  about  Dryden's  in- 
fluence on  English  poetry  we  may  see  in  Dr.  Johnson's 
life  of  that  poet.  He  says  :  "  Every  language  of  a  learned 
nation  necessarily  divides  itself  into  diction  scholastic  and 
popular,  grave  and  familiar,  elegant  and  gross  ;  and  from 
a  nice  distinction  of  these  different  parts  arises  a  great 
part  of  the  beauty  of  style.  .  .  .  There  was  before  the 
time  of  Dryden  no  poetical  diction,  no  system  of  words  at 
once  refined  from  the  grossness  of  domestic  use  and  free 
from  the  harshness  of  terms  appropriated  to  particular 
arts.  From  those  sounds  which  we  hear  on  small  or  on 
coarse  occasions,  we  do  not  easily  receive  strong  impres- 
sions "  (How  about  Lear's  "  Pray  you,  undo  this  button  "  ?) 


66  Engluh  Liierature. 

"  or  delightful  images  ;  and  words  to  which  we  are  nearly 
strangers,  whenever  they  occur,  draw  that  attention  on 
themselves  which  they  should  transmit  to  things.  Those 
happy  combinations  of  words  which  distinguish  poetry 
from  prose  had  been  rarely  attempted :  we  had  few  ele- 
gances or  flowers  of  speech  ;  the  roses  had  not  yet  been 
plucked  from  the  bramble,  or  different  colours  had  not 
been  joined  to  enliven  one  another.  .  .  .  The  new  versifi- 
cation, as  it  was  called,  may  be  considered  as  owing  its 
establishment  to  Dryden  ;  from  whose  time  it  is  apparent 
that  English  poetry  had  no  tendency  to  relapse  to  its  for- 
mer savageness." 

IV.  This  has  a  strange  sound  to  our  ears  ;  savageness, 
indeed  !  We  must  not  forget  that  the  whole  aim  of  this 
school  was  the  abolition  of  "  eccentricity,"  of  "  arbitrari- 
ness," as  Matthew  Arnold  calls  it,*  and  that  although  the 
reaction  has  died  and  arbitrariness  is  again  triumphant, 
this  carefulness,  the  compliance  with  what  the  French 
critics  preached  as  good-sense,  once  did  service. 

Its  methods  are  very  clearly  shown  in  the  translations 
which  Dryden  made.  And  it  is  curious  to  notice  how 
every  new  literary  movement  inspires  its  supporters  with 
the  desire  to  make  a  new  translation  of  the  great  classics. 
Something  may  be  said,  too,  of  the  changes  of  public  taste 
with  regard  to  the  favorite  authors  of  antiquity,  or  of 
modern  times,  too,  for  that  matter.  We  saw  in  the  last 
chapter  the  slow  growth  in  France  of  the  admiration  of 
Homer  ;   in  the  Elizabethan  era  Ovid  f  was  the  favorite 

*  "  Critical  Essays  "  (Am.  ed.),  p.  335. 

f  Maiot  (1495-1544)  wrote: 

"  Ovidius,  niaistre  Alain  Charretier, 
Petrarque  aussi,  le  Roman  do  la  Rose, 
Sont  les  Messelz,  Brcviaire,  and  Psaultier, 
Qu'en  ce  sainct  Temple,  on  list,  en  vithme  et  prose." 


Englidi  Literature.  6y 

poet ;  with  the  increase  of  French  influence  came  renewed 
respect  for  Vergil ;  Pope  translated  one  book  of  Statins — 
to  be  sure,  with  an  apology  ;  Marlowe  translated  the  first 
book  of  Lucan  at  the  end  of  the  sixteenth  century,  and 
two  other  translations  appeared  in  1614  and  1627  respec- 
tively. Horace's  Satires  were  translated  before  the  Odes 
— these  last-named  were  not  all  done  into  English,  it  will 
be  remembered,  until  1625,  and  it  is  only  recently  that 
Catullus  has  been  translated  in  full.  *  There  is  no  need 
of  anything  like  a  complete  list  of  the  translations  of 
Ovid  ;  the  statistics  would  be  tedious.  The  main  point 
is,  that  in  the  Elizabethan  age  he  was  a  favorite  Latin 
poet,  and  that  his  conceits  were  then  thought  more  highly 
of  than  they  now  are.     Horace  was  greatly  admired  in  the 

*  Proofs  of  the  variations  of  taste  are  readily  found.  As  one  indication 
of  this  relative  popularity  at  the  time,  take  the  mottoes  to  the  different 
numbers  of  the  Spectator.  We  find,  from  a  hurried  count,  Horace,  Ars 
Poetica,  Epodes,  and  Satires,  168;  Odes,  51;  Verifil,  124;  Ovid,  55; 
Juvenal,  42;  Persius,  10;  Martial,  14;  Cicero,  26;  Lucretius,  5;  Ter- 
ence, 12;  Seneca,  3;  Lucan,  7;  Tacitus,  Claudian,  and  Catullus,  1. 

Lovelace  translated  ten  or  twelve  poems  of  Catullus,  half-a-dozen  of 
Martial's  epigrams,  and  many  of  those  of  Ausonius. 

"  Boileau  disait :  '  Je  puis  dire  que  c'est  moi  qui  ai  fait  connoitre  les 
satires  et  les  epitres  d'Horace :  on  ne  parlait  que  de  ses  odes.' " — Victor 
Le  Due's  "Boileau,"  p.  7.  But  Vauquelin  de  la  Fresnaie  {vide  infra)  had 
preceded  Boileau  by  nearly  a  century  with  Horatian  satires  and  literary 
rules. 

Percival  Stockdale,  "Lectures  on  Truly  Eminent  English  Poets,"  1807, 
vol.  i.  p.  38 :  "  Your  merely  great  philosophers  have  always  made  a  most 
contemptible  and  ridiculous  figure  when  they  have  usurped  the  chair  of 
poetical  criticism.  Blackmore,  '  rumbling  rough  and  fierce,'  was  the  great- 
est of  poets  in  the  opinion  of  the  venerable  and  illustrious  Locke ;  and 
Catullus  and  Parnell  were  the  first  favorites  of  the  Muses,  in  the  judgement 
of  David  Hume ;  who  was  a  very  great  man  when  he  kept  within  his  meta- 
physical and  historical  sphere."  See,-  too,  vol.  ii.  p.  652,  of  his  tedious 
book. 


68  English  Literature. 

last  century  ;  now  we  are  becoming  more  sensitive  than 
were  our  grandfathers  to  what  we  take  to  be  a  more  pure- 
ly poetic  feeling.     Statius  and  Lucan  scarcely  exist  for  us. 

To  draw  any  inferences  from  the  fact  that  Dryden  trans- 
lated the  "  ^neid,"  and  Pope  Homer,  would  be  a  very 
dangerous  thing,  but  possibly  some  of  the  other  instances 
are  deserving  of  attention.  Similar  alterations  of  taste 
with  regard  to  other  things  will  readily  suggest  them- 
selves, such  as  the  modern  love  of  the  Gothic,  and  for  cer- 
tain Italian  painters  ;  the  cool  feeling  of  us,  who  are  later 
born,  for  the  LaocoOn  and  the  Apollo  Belvedere,  in  com- 
parison with  the  admiration  they  called  forth  in  the  last 
century. 

Every  generation,  then,  has  its  own  way,  not  only  of  ex- 
pressing despairing  love,  the  vanity  of  all  things,  and  the 
mutability  of  fortune,  but  it  also  seeks  to  render  those 
great  poems  that  have  acquired  a  somewhat  similar  im- 
mortality into  such  language  as  shall  at  the  time  seem  the 
fittest  medium  of  expression.  Thus  we  see,  in  every  trans- 
lation, some  of  the  peculiarities  of  the  period  in  which  it 
was  made.     For  example,  Chapman  says  : 

"  But  when  they  joined,  the  dreadful  elamour  rose 

To  such  a  height,  as  not  the  sea,  when  up  the  North-spirit  blows 

Her  raging  billows,  bellows  so  against  the  beaten  shore ; 

Nor  such  a  rustling  keeps  a  fire,  driven  with  violent  blore 

Through  woods  that  grow  against  a  hill ;  nor  so  the  fervent  strokes 

Of  almost  bursting  winds  resound  against  a  grove  of  oaks ; 

As  did  the  clamour  of  these  hosts,  when  both  the  battles  closed." 

"  Iliad,"  xiv.  327. 
Pope  renders  the  passage  as  follows  : 

"  Both  armies  join  :  Earth  thunders,  Ocean  roars. 
Not  half  so  loud  the  bellowing  deeps  resound, 
When  stormy  winds  disclose  the  dark  profound ; 
Less  loud  the  winds  that  from  the  vEolian  hall 
Roar  through  the  woods,  and  make  whole  forests  fall, 


English  Literature.  69 

Less  loud  the  woods,  when  flames  in  torrents  pour, 
Catch  the  dry  mountain  and  its  shades  devour." 

Other  extracts,  with  appropriate  comments,  the  reader 
will  find  in  Mr.  Matthew  Arnold's  "  Lectures  on  Translat- 
ing Homer,"  reprinted  among  his  "  Essays."  As  Mr. 
Swinburne  well  says  of  Chaj^man,  in  the  volume  devoted 
to  the  exposition  of  that  poet's  genius,  his  style  "can 
give  us  but  the  pace  of  a  giant  for  echo  of  the  footfall  of 
a  god."  We  now  go  back  to  Chapman  with  delight,  for 
we  are  ready  to  overlook  his  obvious  errors  ;  but  when 
Pope  lived.  Chapman's  conceits  and  exaggerations  had  be- 
come insufferable,  and  a  new  translation  into  the  language 
of  the  day  was  called  for,  and  this  Pope  furnished.  Poj^e 
gives  his  predecessor  credit  for  the  "  daring,  fiery  spirit 
that  animates  his  translation,  which  is  something  like 
what  one  might  imagine  Homer  himself  would  have  writ 
before  he  arrived  at  years  of  discretion,"  but,  he  says, 
Chapman's  "  expression  is  involved  in  fustian."  In  his 
own  translation.  Pope  complied  with  the  spirit  of  his  time, 
and  was  always  clear  ;  his  style,  too,  was  dignified,  though 
with  a  dignity  very  unlike  Homer's.  Homer's  eloquence 
he  adorned  with  countless  epigrams,  as  when  Helen  ap- 
peared on  the  walls  in  the  third  book  of  the  "  Iliad  :" 

"  Before  thy  presence,  father,  I  appear, 
With  conscious  shame  and  reverential  fear. 
Ah  !  had  I  died,  ere  to  these  walls  I  fled, 
False  to  my  country  and  my  nuptial  bed  ; 
My  brothers,  friends,  and  daughters  left  behind, 
False  to  them  all,  to  Paris  only  kind. 
For  this  I  mourn,  till  grief  or  dire  disease 
Shall  waste  the  form  whose  crime  it  was  to  please." 

This  was  part  of  the  same  spirit  that  enabled  the  actors 
representing  Greeks  and  Romans  to  appear  in  high-heeled 
shoes,  coats,  and  full  wigs.     Cowper,  in  his  turn,  expressed 


70  Eiujlhh  Literature. 

the  modern  reaction  against  the  epigrammatic  couplet, 
and  the  reverence  for  Milton  which  we  shall  see  growing 
up  throughout  the  last  century  ;  he  took  Homer  out  of 
that,  at  length,  unfashionable  suit,  and  put  him  into  the 
chains  of  the  Miltonic  inversions.  Thus,  in  the  answer  of 
Achilles'  horses  : 

"  For  not  through  sloth  or  tardiness  on  us 
Aught  chargeable,  have  Ilion's  sons  thine  arras 
Stript  from  Patroelus'  shoulders ;  but  a  god, 
Matchless  in  battle,  offspring  of  bright-haired 
Latona,  him  contending  in  the  van, 
Slew,  for  the  glory  of  the  chief  of  Troy." 

Gary,  Lamb's  friend,  translated  Dante  in  the  same  way. 

In  our  own  times,  which  are  those  of  critical  examina- 
tion and  experiment,  we  find  Mr.  Newman  trying  the  bal- 
lad measure,  as  in  this  passage  : 

"0  gentle  friend  !  if  thou  and  I,  from  this  encounter  'scaping, 
Hereafter  might  forever  be  from  Eld  and  Death  exempted 
As  heavenly  gods,  not  I,  in  sooth,  would  fight  among  the  foremost^ 
Nor  liefly  thee  would  I  advance  to  man-ennobling  battle. 
Now — sith  ten  thousand  shapes  of  Death  do  any-gait  pursue  us, 
Which  never  mortal  may  evade,  tho'  sly  of  foot  and  nimble; 
Onward !"  etc. 

We  have  to  add  Mr.  Worsley's  translation  of  the 
"  Odyssey  "  in  the  Spenserian  stanza  ;  Lord  Derby's  and 
Mr.  Bryant's  into  blank  verse  ;  Conington's  rendering  of 
Vergil,  the  most  polished  of  authors,  in  the  rough-and- 
ready  measure  of  "Marmion."  One  might  as  well  try  to 
whistle  a  symphony.  Then,  too,  Mr.  William  Morris,  af- 
ter playing  for  some  time  that  he  was  Chaucer,  j^iit  the 
"^Eneids,"  as  he  called  the  poem,  into  early  English,  as 
thus,  when  Hector's  ghost  appears  in  the  second  book  : 

"  Most  sorrowful  to  see  he  was,  and  weeping  plenteous  flood, 
And  e'en  as  torn,  beiiind  the  car,  black  witli  tiie  dust  and  blood, 


Enylish  Literature.  yi 

His  feet  all  swollen  with  the   thong  that  pierced   them  through  and 

through. 
Woe  worth   the  while  for  what  he  was !    how  changed  from  him  we 

knew !" 

And  everywhere  we  come  upon  such  mock-English  as 
"  why  thus  wise,"  etc. 

Mr.  Arnold  recommends  translating  Homer  into  English 
hexameters,  while  Mr.  Tennyson,  again,  gives  us  a  speci- 
men in  blank  verse. 

In  his  discussion  of  the  course  to  be  followed  by  a  trans- 
lator, Dryden  is,  as  he  always  is  in  his  prefaces,  very  in- 
teresting. He  says  :  "  When  I  have  taken  away  some  of 
their  expressions,  and  ci;t  them  shorter,  it  may  j^ossibly  be 
on  this  consideration  that  what  was  beautiful  in  the  Greek 
or  Latin  would  not  appear  so  shining  in  the  English  ;  and 
when  I  have  enlarged  them,  I  desire  the  false  critics  would 
not  always  think  that  those  thoughts  are  wholly  mine,  but 
_th:it  citlKT  tliey  are  secretly  in  the  poet,  or  may  be  fairly 
deduced  from  him  ;  or  at  least,  if  both  these  considera- 
tions should  fail,  that  my  own  is  of  a  piece  with  his,  and 
that  if  he.w^reJUying^ndjaiL^E^  tiiey  are  such 

as  he  would  probably  have  written.  For,  after  all,  a  trans- 
lator is  to  make  his  author  appear  as  charming  as  possibly 
he  can,  provided  he  maintains  his  character,  and  makes 
him  not  unlike  himself."  *  It  is  really  hard  to  stop  quot- 
ing, but  there  is  one  brief  passage  which  possibly  was 
newer  two  hundred  years  ago  than  it  is  now  :  "  Not  only 
the  thoughts,  but  the  style  and  versification  of  Virgil  and 
Ovid  are  very  diiferent  ;  yet  I  see,  even  in  our  best  poets, 

*  The  lack  of  precision  in  the  first  translations  of  foreign  books  is  wor- 
tliy  of  note.  Anything  strange  has  to  have  its  peculiarities  rubbed  off 
before  it  interests  us.  Thus,  while  now  we  demand  exact  rendering  of 
Homer  and  Vergil,  we  accept  the  Mahabharata  very  much  diluted  with 
modernisms  from  the  pen  of  Mr.  Edwin  Arnold. 


72  English  Literature. 

who  have  translated  some  part  of  them,  that  they  have 
confounded  their  several  talents  ;  and,  by  endeavouring 
only  at  the  sweetness  and  harmony  of  numbers,  have  made 
them  both  so  much  alike,  that  if  I  did  not  know  the  orig- 
inals, I  should  never  be  able  to  judge  by  the  cojjies,  which 
was  Virgil  and  which  was  Ovid."  Dryden's  obiter  dicta 
on  matters  generally  pronounced  upon  only  by  scholars 
are  very  valuable,  for  the  quality  of  a  man's  genius  is 
more  important  in  his  judgment  of  matters  of  taste  than 
any  amount  of  education.  But  I  resist  all  temptations  to 
quote  lavishly,  and  pass  over  to  the  end  of  the  preface, 
where  Dry  den  says  :  "  Milton's  '  Paradise  Lost '  is  admira- 
ble ;  but  am  I,  therefore,  bound  to  maintain,  that  there 
are  no  flats  amongst  his  elevations,  when  'tis  evident  he 
creeps  along  sometimes,  for  above  an  hundred  lines  togeth- 
er ?  Cannot  I  admire  the  height  of  his  invention,  and  the 
strength  of  his  invention,  without  defending  his  anti- 
quated Avords,  and  the  perpetiial  harshness  of  their  sound? 
It  is  as  much  commendation  as  a  man  can  bear,  to  own 
him  excellent ;  all  beyond  is  idolatry."  This  is  the  place 
where  we  rest  with  regard  to  Dryden.  The  modern  feel- 
ing towards  him  is  certainly  not  idolatrous. 

V.  Dryden  had  no  question  in  his  mind  as  to  the  form 
in  which  the  translations  should  appear  :  there  was  but 
one,  and  that  one  he  made  use  of.  There  is  certainly  a 
great  charm  in  his  renderings  of  Chaucer,  of  whom  he 
speaks  at  some  length.  In  the  older  poet's  verse  Dryden 
says  "  there  is  the  rude  sweetness  of  a  Scotch  tune  which 
is  natural  and  pleasing,  though  not  perfect."  I  have  not 
space  to  quote  the  opening  of  the  "•  Nun's  Priest's  Tale,"* 

*  The  following  correspondence  explains  Dryden's  choice : 

"Dkydkn  to  Pepys. 

"July  14,  I()99. 
'^  Padron  mio, — I  rctncnibcr  last  year,  when  I  liml  the  honour  of  dining 


English  Literature.  73 

or  of  "  The  Cock  and  the  Fox ;"  but,  although  the  newer 
form  has  a  quality  which  does  not  belong  to  Chaucer,  it  is 
yet  well  worth  attention,  and  I  think  that  even  those  who 
know  the  originals  will  read  Dryden's  versions  with  de- 
lio-ht.  And  since  the  bane  of  the  present  day  is  pedan- 
try, and  many  otherwise  worthy  persons  will  avow  that 
they  are  led  by  love  of  sincerity  to  condemn  any  working- 
over  of  Chaucer's  material,  I  would  add  that  even  now 
there  are  constantly  appearing  renderings  of  Chaucer,  and 
that  in  one  of  the  most  celebrated  we  find  versions  con- 
tributed by  Wordsworth,  Mrs.  Browning,  R.  H.  Home, 
etc.,  whose  names  are  not  proverbial  for  insincerity.  The 
true  test,  of  course,  is  the  poems  themselves,  and  they  are 
among  the  most  readable  things  Dryden  ever  wrote.  In 
the  course  of  time  the  controversial  poems  will,  I  think, 

with  you,  you  were  pleased  to  recommend  to  me  the  character  of  Chaucer's 
'  Good  Parsou.'  Any  desire  of  yours  is  a  command  to  me,  and  according- 
ly I  have  put  it  into  my  English,  with  such  additions  and  alterations  as  I 
thought  fit. 

"  Having  translated  as  many  fables  from  Ovid,  and  as  many  novels  from 
Boccace  and  tales  from  Chaucer,  as  will  make  an  indifferent  large  volume 
in  folio,  I  intend  them  for  the  press  in  Michaelmas  Term  next.  In  the 
mean  time,  my  'Parson'  desires  the  favour  of  being  known  to  you,  and 
promises,  if  you  find  any  fault  in  his  character,  he  will  reform  it.  When- 
ever you  please,  he  shall  wait  on  you,  and  for  the  safer  conveyance,  I  will 
carry  him  in  my  pocket,  who  am 

"  My  padron's  most  obedient  servant, 

"  John  Drtden." 

Pepys  answered  on  the  same  day : 

"  You  truly  have  obliged  me,  and,  possibly,  in  saying  so,  t  am  more  in 
earnest  than  you  can  readily  think,  as  verily  hoping  from  this  your  copy 
of  our  '  Good  Parson '  to  fancy  some  amends  made  me  for  the  hourly  of- 
fence I  bear  with  from  the  sight  of  so  many  lewd  originals." 

Pepys's  collection  of  ballads,  left  to  Magdalen  College,  Cambridge,  was 
the  main  source  of  Percy's  "Reliques;"  vide  his  Preface.  Pepys  was  one 
of  the  men  whose  taste  was  not  merely  that  of  his  day. 

4 


74  iLnyltsh  Ldtralui'e. 

lose  their  interest,  but  the  charm  of  these  will  never  quite 
disappear.  He  calls  the  birds  "the  painted  birds,"  to  be 
sure,  and  the  nightingale  is  Philomel.  Drjden,  in  a 
word,  used  the  language  of  his  time  ;  and  is  not  that,  in 
some  respects,  better  employment  than  frantically  strug-^ 
gliug  to  use  the  language  of  some  other  time  ?  Dryden, 
too,  was  clear,  and  that  is  a  merit  in  these  days,  when 
the  reader  has  put  before  him  alliterative  obscurity  like 

this  : 

"  Hollow  lieaven  and  the  hurricane, 

And  hurry  of  the  heavy  rain. 

"  Hurried  clouds  in  the  hollow  heaven, 
And  a  heavy  rain  hard-driven. 

"  The  heavy  rain,  it  hurries  amain, 
And  heaven  and  the  hurricane. 

"  Hurrying  wind  o'er  the  heaven's  hollow. 
And  the  heavy  rain  to  follow."  * 

Dryden's  odes  are  well  known.  His  "  Song  for  St,  Ce- 
cilia's Day  "  and  his  "  Alexander's  Feast "  are  among  the 
familiar  poems  of  the  language  ;  but  there  are  others  less 
familiar — as,  for  instance,  that  on  Anne  Killigrew,  which 
Dr,  Johnson  said  "  is  the  noblest  ode  that  our  language 
ever  has  produced,"  It  was  Cowley  who  revived  the 
composition  of  odes,  which  he  called  "the  noblest  and 
highest  writing  in  verse,"  and  Dr.  Johnson  styled  "  lax  and 
lawless  versification."  The  odes  were  further  called 
Pindaric  by  a  flight  of  the  imagination,  which  was  not 
always  to  be  found  in  the  poems  themselves. 

The  first  and  finest  stanza  of  the  ode  on  Anne  Killi- 
grew runs  thus : 

"Thou  youngest  virgin-daughter  of  the  skies, 
Made  in  the  last  promotion  of  the  bless'd  ; 

*  "Chimes,"  D.  G.  Rossetti's  "  Ballads  and  Sonnets,"  p.  281. 


English  Literature.  -jc^ 

Whose  palms,  new-pluck'd  from  paradise, 
In  spreading  branches  more  sublimely  rise, 
Rich  with  immortal  gi-een  above  the  rest : 
Whether  adopted  to  some  neighb'ring  star, 
Thou  roll'st  above  us,  in  thy  wandering  race ; 

Or,  in  procession  fix'd  and  regular, 

Mov'st  with  the  heaven's  majestic  pace; 

Or,  called  to  more  superior  bliss. 
Thou  tread'st,  with  seraphims,  the  vast  abyss : 
Whatever  happy  region  is  thy  place, 
Cease  thy  celestial  song  a  little  space ; 
Thou  wilt  have  time  enough  for  hymns  divine, 

Since  heaven's  eternal  year  is  thine. 
Hear  then  a  mortal  Muse  thy  praise  rehearse, 

In  no  ignoble  verse." 

Joseph  Warton,  however,  said  that  "  to  a  cool  and  candid 
reader,  it  appears  absolutely  unintelligible.  Examples  of 
bad  writing,  of  tumid  expressions,  violent  metaphors,  far- 
sought  conceits,  hyperbolical  adulation,  unnatural  amplifi- 
cations, interspersed,  as  usual,  Avitli  fine  lines,  might  be 
collected  from  this  applauded  ode."  And,  in  fact,  in  the 
last  stanza  we  come  across  a  passage  that  illustrates  one 
of  Dryden's  faults  very  clearly  : 

"  When  in  mid  air  the  golden  trump  shall  sound, 
To  raise  the  nations  underground  : 
When  in  the  valley  of  Jehoshaphat, 
The  judging  God  shall  close  the  book  of  fate ; 
And  there  the  last  assizes  keep 
For  those  who  wake  and  those  who  sleep  : 
When  rattling  bones  together  fly 
From  the  four  corners  of  the  sky." 

Indeed,  the  Day  of  Judgment  seems  to  have  aroused 
singular  notions  in  Dryden,  for  elsewhere  he  speaks  of  the 
"  drowsy  mortals,"  and  says,  "  When,  called  in  haste,  they 
fumble  for  their  limbs"  ("Don  Sebastian").  Moreover, 
it  would  be  hard  to  name  another  writer  of  reputation 


'j6  English  Literature. 

who  mingles  fine  lines  and  bad  ones  in  such  confusion  as 
Drjden  continually  does.  In  the  passage  I  have  just  read, 
the  fine-sounding  line,  which  reminds  us  of  the  line  in  Mr. 
Fitzgerald's  translation  of  "Omar  Khayyam"  (2d  ed.), 
"  That  we  might  catch  ere  closed  the  book  of  fate,"  *  comes 
just  before  the  most  unjjoetic  lines  of  the  ode,  which  then 
rises  to  a  finer  ending.  It  is  easy  to  find  many  examples  of 
similar  carelessness.  His  plays  are  full  of  jjassages  that 
would  have  made  the  fortune  of  a  burlesque.  Thus,  in  the 
"Royal  Martyr,"  Maximin,  the  tyrant,  says  to  the  gods  : 

"Keep  your  rain  and  sunshine  in  the  skies, 
And  I'll  keep  back  my  flame  and  sacrifice ; 
Your  trade  of  Heaven  shall  soon  be  at  a  stand, 
And  all  your  goods  lie  dead  upon  your  hand." 

And  the  same  tyrant,  when  dying,  says  : 

"  And  after  thee  I'll  go, 
Revenging  still,  and  following  e'en  to  th'  other  world  my  blow, 
And,  shoving  back  this  earth  on  which  I  sit, 
I'll  mount  and  scatter  all  the  gods  I  hit." 

And  how  Dryden  could  mix  paltriness  with  beauty,  we 
may  see  in  this  passage  ("Conquest  of  Granada")  : 

"  That  busy  thing, 
The  soul,  h  "packing  up,  and  just  on  wing 
Like  parting  swallows  when  they  seek  the  spring." 

And  often,  too,  he  could  be  dreary  without  relief,  as  when 
a  dying  hero  (in  "Amboyna")  says  : 

"  Give  to  my  brave 

Employers  of  the  East  India  Company, 

*  Pope,  "  Essay  on  Man,"  i.  77  : 

"  Ileav'n  from  all  creatures  hides  the  book  of  fate." 
Shakspere,  "  2  Henry  IV.,"  III.  i.  45  : 

"  0  God !  that  we  might  read  the  book  of  fate." 


English  Literature.  yj 

The  last  remembrance  of  my  faitliful  service ; 
Tell  them  I  seal  that  service  with  my  blood ; 
And,  dying,  wish  to  all  their  factories. 
And  all  the  famous  merchants  of  our  isle. 
That  wealth  their  generous  industry  deserves." 

As  Dryden  himself  said,  "A  man  must  not  write  all  he 
can,  but  all  he  ought  ;"  yet  very  often  Dryden  was  com- 
pelled by  want  to  write  all  he  could,  and  the  result  was 
bad.  That  he  should  have  been  ridiculed  by  some  of  the 
writers  of  his  time  is  not  strange,  for  we  will  all  acknowl- 
edge that  the  contemporaries  of  a  great  man  are  apt  to 
judge  him  by  his  failures,  while  posterity  estimates  his  po- 
sition by  what  is  best  in  his  work.  Everywhere  Dryden 
has  given  abundant  traces  of  ability.  He  possessed  va- 
rious qualities — the  mastery  of  versification,  and,  for  that 
matter,  of  prose  ;  he  reasoned  ingeniously  ;  and  he  had  a 
fine  poetic  quality  that  lights  up  what  we  nowadays  are 
accustomed  to  regard  as  an  unpoetic  style.  His  lyrical 
power,  too,  must  not  be  forgotten. 

These  poems  lead  us  to  his  plays,  in  which  his  faults 
and  his  merits  are  most  fully  shown.  Whatever  our 
opinion  of  his  poetic  powers  may  be,  there  can  be  no 
doubt  of  the  important  place  he  fills  in  any  study  of  Eng- 
lish literature.  He  was  the  greatest  English  poet  after 
Milton  for  at  least  a  century,  and  he  helped,  more  than 
any  one,  to  shape  the  laws  w^hich  prevailed  for  that  period. 
We  have  seen  what  these  were  in  verse  ;  let  us  now  ex- 
amine the  condition  of  the  stage  at  the  time  of  the  Res- 
toration, and  its  subsequent  development. 


78  Englhh  Literature. 


CHAPTER  III. 

I.  So  far  we  have  seen  no  very  striking  instances  of  any 
close  resemblance  between  the  English  and  the  French 
styles.  Dry  den's  asperities,  as  well  as  his  vigor,  are  very 
unlike  the  polish  of  the  French,  yet  in  the  imitations  of 
the  French  thoughtfulness  and  reason  we  see  a  continual 
effort  to  model  the  Englishman  after  his  neighbor  across 
the  Channel.  In  fact,  there  was  hardly  any  period  when 
the  French  and  English  were  more  unlike  than  they  were 
just  at  the  time  when  Dryden  lived.  In  France,  after  the 
great  civil  and  religious  wars  of  the  sixteenth  century, 
there  was  a  very  marked  movement  towards  refinement  and 
social  cultivation,  and  the  advance  of  civilization  was  very 
swift.  Those  who  took  an  interest  in  literature  wei'e  quick 
to  respond  to  their  guides,  who  showed  great  intelligence 
in  discovering  and  directing  the  tastes  of  the  French  peo- 
ple. The  court,  too,  was  not  in  hostility  to  the  rest  of  the 
country,  as  was  the  case  in  England  after  the  Restoration. 
There  was  in  France  no  public  outside  of  fashionable  cir- 
cles,* and  these  responded  quickly  to  the  polish  which  was 

*  Lotheissen  says:  "Wahrcnd  des  XVIP"  Jahrhunderts  gibt  das  Biir- 
gerthum  wohl  eine  Reihe  von  Gelehrtcn  uiid  gebildcten  Manncrn ;  es  erhe- 
ben  sich  aus  seinen  Reihen  die  griissten  Dichter  die  Fraukreich  je  beses- 
sen  ;  aber  diese  alle  arbeiten  mir  fiir  IIurkrei.se,  fiii-  die  AVelt  des  Adeis  und 
der  hohen  Gesellscbaft." — "  Geschichte  der  fraaziJzischen  Literatur  des 
XVII'*"  Jahrhunderts,"  i.  17. 


English  Literature.  79 

preaclied  and  illustrated  by  the  literary  leaders.  The 
romances  of  the  time  were  not  mere  accumulations  of 
vapid  sentiment ;  they  inculcated  virtue  and  refinement ; 
their  heroes  were  knightly  persons — tedious,  to  be  sure, 
but  true  to  a  high  ideal.  The  French  tragedians  expressed 
the  same  civilizing  qualities.  If  it  be  objected  that  the 
Gi'eeks  and  Romans  whom  they  put  upon  the  stage  are 
really  Frenchmen  with  classical  names,  that  is,  after  all,  a 
conventionalism  which,  if  once  acknowledged  to  exist,  need 
not  trouble  us  longer.  There  is  a  certain  amount  of  ped- 
antry in  demanding  faithfulness  to  an  ideal  when  nobody 
knows  with  precision  what  the  ideal  really  is.  Then,  too, 
even  Greeks  and  Romans  who  are  like  Frenchmen  have 
an  advantage  over  the  Greeks  and  Romans  of  the  English 
stage  after  the  Restoration,  who  are  like  no  one  that  ever 
lived. 

As  we  have  already  seen,  it  was  at  the  end  of  the  six- 
teenth century  and  the  beginning  of  the  next  (1555-1628) 
that  Malherbe  in  France  was  really,  so  far  as  one  man  can  be 
said  to  do  anything  of  the  kind,  moulding  the  course  which 
French  literature  was  to  follow  for  two  hundred  years. 
His  predecessors  tried  to  introduce  classical  words,  phrases, 
and  forms  into  French.  Malherbe,  however,  though  of  very 
moderate  ability  as  a  poet,  allied  himself  with  those  who 
preferred  to  aid  the  development  of  the  French  language. 
This  was  the  democratic  side,  one  may  say,  if  we  remember  \ 
that  what  we  call  the  people  were  wholly  without  influence.A 
Perhaps  it  would  be  better  to  say  that  this  was  the  modern 
side.  But,  while  he  did  this,  he  threw  overboard  almost 
everything  else  that  we  are  accustomed  to  regard  as  essen- 
tial to  poetry  ;  and,  while  he  insisted  on  precise  versification 
and  exact  rhymes,  he  avoided  picturesque  language  and 
recommended  smooth  commonplaces.  French  literature 
became  correct,  but  it  paid  for  it  by  becoming  compara- 


8o  English  Literature. 

tively  lifeless.  I  say  comparatively  lifeless,  for,  if  French 
tragedy  is  marked  by  mannerisms,  the  comedy  at  least  had 
a  higher  life  than  it  had  in  England. 

The  correctness,  then,  of  the  French  was  more  or  less 
the  model  set  before  English  writers  after  the  Restoration, 
/  yet  they  seldom  attained  more  than  an  outside  polish.  Let 
us  see  what  it  was  they  did  in  the  drama.  Even  before  the 
Commonwealth  we  notice  the  gradual  detei'ioration  of  the 
plays,  if  indeed  Jonson's  method  may  not  be  looked  on  as 
the  first  step  towards  artificial  composition  ;  those  play- 
wrights whom  we  call  great  began  to  vie  with  one  another 
in  accumulating  horrors,  although  they  all  had  part  of  the 
grand  style,  and  knew  how  to  relieve  what  was  terrible  by 
bits  of  natural  beauty  and  pathos. 

II.  In  preparation  for  the  struggle  that  was  to  come, 
the  Puritans  early  began  their  attack  upon  the  stage.  Even 
about  1575  they  opposed  the  building  of  theatres  in  every 
way  in  their  power,  and  they  wrote  tracts  and  large  vol- 
\imes  against  it,  but  the  main  attack  was  made  in  1633  in 
a  book  called  the  "  Histrio-Mastix,"  written  by  William 
'  Prynne.  Its  full  title  ran  thus^  "  Histrio-Mastix,  The 
Players  Scourge  ;  or,  Actors  Tragedie,  Divided  into  Two 
Parts.  Wherein  it  is  largely  evidenced,  by  divers  Argu- 
ments, by  the  Concurring  Authorities  and  Resolutions  of 
sundry  Texts  of  Scripture,  of  the  whole  Primitive  Church, 
both  under  the  Law  and  the  Gospell ;  of  55  Sy nodes  and 
Councils;  of  71  Fathers  and  Christian  Writers  before 
the  Year  of  our  Lord  1200  ;  of  about  150  foraigne  and 
domestique  Protestant  and  Popish  Authors,  since  ;  of 
40  Heathen  Pliilosophers,  Historians,  Poets,  of  many 
Heathen,  many  Christian  Nations,  Republiques,  Emper- 
ors, Princes,  Magistrates  ;  of  sundry  Apostolicall,  Canon- 
icall,  Imperiall  Constitutions  ;  and  of  our  own  English 
Statutes,   Magistrates,   Universities,  Writers,   Preachers. 


English  Literature.  8i 

That  popular  Stage-playes  (the  very  Pompes  of  the  Divell 
which  we  renounce  in  Baptisme,  if  we  believe  the  Fathers) 
are  sinf  ull,  heathenish,  lewde,  ungodly  spectacles,  and  most 
pernicious  Corruptions  ;  condemned  in  all  ages,  as  intoler- 
able Mischiefes  to  Churches,  to  Republickes,  to  the  man- 
ners, mindes,  and  soules  of  men.  And  that  the  Profession 
of  Play-poets,  of  Stage-players  ;  together  with  the  pen- 
ning, acting,  and  frequenting  of  Stage-plays,  are  unlaw- 
full,  infamous  and  misbeseeming  Christians.  All  pre- 
tences to  the  contrary  are  here  likewise  fully  answered  ; 
and  the  unlawfulness  of  acting,  of  beholding  Academicall 
Interludes,  briefly  discussed  ;  besides  sundry  other  partic- 
ulars concerning  Dancing,  Dicing,  Health-Drinking,  etc., 
of  which  the  Table  Avill  informe  you." 

That  the  work  of  the  literary  critic  in  those  days  was 
laborious  is  shown  by  this  title,  as  well  as  by  the  fact, 
which  I  quote  at  second-hand,  that  it  contains,  according 
to  one  estimate,  one  hundred  thousand  references  ;*  I  have 
not  counted  them.  It  is  also  said  that  four  thousand  texts 
are  quoted  against  the  stage.  That  it  was  perilous  is  shown 
by  Prynne's  punishment  for  his  violence.  Those  who  danced 
or  looked  on  at  dancing,  he  said,  assisted  at  a  lewd  service 
of  the  devil.  This  was  construed  as  an  insult  to  the  queen, 
who  occasionally  danced  at  court  masques,  and  Prynne's 
sentence  ran  :  "  That  Master  Prynne  should  be  committed 
to  prison  diu'ing  life,  pay  a  fine  of  £5000  to  the  king,  be 

*  He  refers  to  about  one  thousand  authorities,  and  there  are  1106  pages. 

This  is  his  manner  (p.  65) :  "  Tliat  the  stile  and  subject  matter  of  most  is 
amorous  and  obscene ;  it  is  as  evident  as  the  morning  sunne.  1st,  by  the 
express  and  punctual  testimony  of  sundry  Fathers.  Read  but "  (sixty-four 
references)  "to  whom  I  adde"  (twelve  more). 

"  Peruse,  I  say,  but  these  several  Fathers  and  councils  (whose  words,  if  I 
should  at  large  transcribe  them,  would  amount  unto  an  ample  volume), 
and  you  shall  find  them  all  concur  in  this." 

4* 


82  Jiiiylitih  Literature. 

expelled  Lincoln's  Inn,  disbarred  and  disabled  ever  to  exer- 
cise the  profession  of  a  barrister  ;  degraded  by  the  Univer- 
sity of  Oxford  of  his  degree  there  taken  ;  and  that  done, 
be  set  in  the  pillory  at  Westminster,  with  a  paj^er  on  his 
head  declaring  the  nature  of  his  offence,  and  have  one  of 
his  ears  there  cut  off,  and  at  another  time  be  set  in  the  pil- 
lory at  Cheapside,  with  a  paper  as  aforesaid,  and  then  have 
his  other  ear  cut  off  ;  and  that  a  fire  shall  be  made  before 
the  said  pillory,  and  the  hangman  being  there  ready  for 
that  purpose,  shall  publicly  in  disgraceful  manner  cast  all 
the  said  books  which  could  be  produced  into  the  fire  to  be 
burnt,  as  unfit  to  be  seen  by  any  hereafter."  * 

On  the  second  of  September,  1642,  the  ordinance  passed 
the  Lords  and  Commons,  stating  that  "  while  these  sad 
causes  and  set-times  of  humiliation  do  continue,  stage- 
plays  shall  cease  and  be  forborne."  This  law  was  evaded 
in  some  few  instances  by  the  few  actors  who  were  found 
in  London  ;  these  acted  in  obscure  taverns,  at  private 
houses,  etc.,  but  in  the  main  the  law  was  observed. 

III.  Li  1656,  Sir  William  Davenant,  of  whom  mention 
has  been  made,  ventured  to  bring  forth  an  entertainment 
made  up  of  declamation  and  music  "  after  the  manner  of 
the  ancients,"  which  was  no  play,  but,  in  fact,  an  opera. 
This  was  made  over  into  a  play  and  represented  in  its  new 
form  after  the  Restoration,  when  its  author  was  Charles 

*  Prvnne  is  said  to  have  recanted,  and  in  1041)  tliere  appeared  a  tiiin 
pamphlet  with  this  title :  "  Mr.  William  riynue  his  defense  of  Stage  itlays  ; 
or,  a  Retraction  of  a  former  book  of  his  called  '  Ilistrio-Mastix.'  "  In  this 
recantation  there  is  an  apology  for  calling  Charles  I.  Nero,  and  the  queen 
by  worse  names,  for  being  interested  in  plays.  Mention  is  made  of  the 
fact  that  George  Buchanan,  Barclay,  and  otliers  wrote  for  the  stage,  and 
it  is  said  tliat  the  drama  might  also  teacli  lessons  of  virtue. 

The  genuineness  of  the  pamphlet  is,  however,  open  to  doul)t.  No  man 
ever  changes  his  mind  after  establishing  his  views  by  more  than  seventy- 
live  thousand  references. 


English  Llttndure.  83 

II. 's  poet-laureate,  and  the  manager  of  one  of  the  two  dra- 
matic companies  then  licensed.  The  play  itself  is  note- 
worthy for  two  or  three  things  outside  of  its  purely  liter- 
ary qualities — these  call  for  no  comment.  First,  it  was  one 
of  the  plays  in  which  women  appeared  upon  the  stage. 
This  had  happened  occasionally  before,  but  now  it  became 
the  rule,  with  but  few  exceptions,  that  the  women's  parts 
should  be  played  by  women.  Secondly,  Davenant  intro- 
duced in  this  play  something  like  scene-painting  :  for  the 
first  time  an  attempt  was  made,  by  means  of  the  decora- 
tion of  the  proscenium,  to  give  some  scenic  effect.  In  the 
third  place,  but  less  important,  was  the  fact  that  the  music 
introduced  into  this  play  remained,  with  the  singing  and 
dancing,  in  all  the  heroic  plays  ;  and  fourthly,  and  finally, 
it  was  written  in  rhymed  couplets,  after  the  manner  of  the 
French  tragedians.  That  these  plays  bore  much  resem- 
blance to  the  masterpieces  of  the  French  stage  cannot  be 
aflirmed,  and  even  the  sound  of  the  lines  is  very  unlike 
that  of  the  models.  Yet  it  is  this  resemblance  to  the  eye 
which  is  almost  the  only  one  between  the  plays  of  the  two 
countries.  What  the  English  did  under  the  influence  of 
French  literature  was  something  different.  They  were  not 
inspired  to  any  considerable  extent  by  the  great  plays  ;  it 
was  rather  the  long,  artificial  heroic  romances  that  are  re- 
sponsible for  the  English  heroic  drama,*  which  was  really 
a  most  mongrel  creation.  Let  us,  for  example,  compare  the 
subjects  of  the  French  tragedies  with  those  of  Dry  den  and 
his  fellow-countrymen.  The  French  writers,  almost  with- 
out exception,  selected  classical  subjects,  Cinna,  Horace, 
Bntannicus,  IpMgeneia,  Phcedra,  Andromaehe.  Where  do 
we  find  such  a  collection  of  classical  subjects  in  the  Eng- 
lish literature  of  the  time  ?     No  :  the  English  playwrights 

*  Yet  the  French  tragedy  was  not  without  the  same  tendency.      Vide 
Corneille's  "  Cid,"  "  Don  Sanche,"  etc. 


84  English  Literature. 

chose  such  subjects  as  the  Indian  Queen,  the  Indian  Em- 
peror, the  Maiden  Queen,  the  Moyal  Martyr,  the  Con- 
quest of  Granada,  the  Empress  of  Morocco.  The  same 
inspiration  could  not  have  been  at  work  in  both  countries. 
The  English  dramatists  found  to  some  extent  their  plots, 
and  much  more  their  way  of  drawing  characters,  in  these 
long  romances  I  have  mentioned,  very  much  as  the  Eliza- 
bethan writers  took  their  plots  from  the  early  Italian 
novelists — Bandello,  etc. 

The  English  representative  of  the  combination  of  pas- 
toral and  knightly  romances  is  Sidney's  "  Arcadia  "  (written 
in  1580  and  1581,  and  published  in  1590).  The  pastoral  part 
was  due  to  Italian  influence,  for  it  was  in  Italy  that  this, 
like  most  of  the  forms  of  literature  that  have  flourished  in 
Europe,  first  made  its  appearance.  It  was  at  about  the  end 
of  the  fifteenth  century,  about  1472,  that  the  earliest  of  the 
pastorals  was  written,  the  "  Orfeo  "  of  Poliziano.  This  was 
a  combination  of  tragedy,  pastoral,  and  opera  ;  a  dramatic 
poem  of  four  hundred  and  thirty-four  lines,  and  lyrical 
rather  than  tragical.*  It  was  quickly  followed  by  a 
host  of  rustic  comedies,  eclogues,  etc.  One  nearly  con- 
temporary work  which  had  a  great  influence  on  Sidney 
was  Sanazzaro's  "  Arcadia  "  (1504).  This  was  in  prose  and 
verse,  and  consisted  of  twelve  prose  pieces,  each  introduc- 
ing an  eclogue  ;  but,  while  it  referred  after  a  fashion  to 
events  in  Sanazzaro's  life,  it  lacked  all  plot.  The  book  is 
a  mere  accumulation  of  pastoral  scenery  and  machinery, 
not  a  coherent  tale  or  poem,  and  we  read  it  now  as  a  col- 
lection of  charming  descriptions,  or  as  a  literary  curiosity. 
Here  began  the  custom  of  giving  living  persons  pastoral 
names,  which  ran  through  all  the  literatures  of  Europe,  and 
even  survived  as  late  as  th^beginning  of  this  century. 

*  nWe  Symonds'ri  "Italian  Renaissance,"  iv.  412. 


EnyUsh  Literature.  85 

Pastorals,  which  soon  degenerated  into  a  mere  literary 
form,  were  at  first  the  poetical  representations  of  a  new 
ideal.  As  Catholicism  lost  its  hold  on  the  world,  and  the 
expectation  of  a  life  of  happiness  beyond  the  grave  grew 
faint,  men  looked  back  to  the  past  as  to  a  period  of  inno- 
cence and  flawless  happiness.  Visions  of  Paradise,  which 
were  as  dim  as  prophecies,  seemed  to  be  fragmentary  recol- . 
lections  of  a  distant  past;  Ovid's  "  Metamorphoses,"  Theoc- 
ritus's  "  Idylls,"  and  Vergil's  "  Eclogues  "  directly  favored 
this  idea.*  The  Golden  Age  was  suddenly  put  back  into 
the  remote  time  which  was  supposed  to  have  been  a  period 
of  pastoral  simplicity.  This  it  was  which  inspired  much  of 
the  new"  literature,  and  in  time  grew  to  be  the  ideal  of  nat- 
ure current  throughout  civilized  Europe,  which  the  Italian 
Arcadians  sought  to  imitate, f  and  painters  and  poets  had 
in  their  mind  until  Rousseau  let  in  the  fresh  air  with  his 
praise  of  the  Alps  in  the  "  Nouvelle  Heloise."  Yet,  while 
Rousseau  demolished  the  rococo  prettiness  of  Arcadia,  he 
gave  new  life  to  the  underlying  notion  that  civilization  was 
degradation,  by  using  all  his  eloquence  to  prove  that  men 
were  born  equal  and  had  been  happy  and  virtuous  only  in 
a  savage  state.  This  was  the  underlying  principle  of  many 
socialist  schemes. 

The  notion  of  a  i^ast  Golden  Age  may  be  said  to  have 
died  only  within  a  few  years,  modern  scientific  discoveries 
placing  it,  if  anywhere,  in  the  future.  The  old  theory  lin- 
gers, however,  jn  comparatively  recent  books.  Archbishop 
Whateley,  for  instance,  in  his  text-book  on  Rhetoric,  warm- 
ly upholds  the  hypothesis  that  savages  are  all  degenerate 
descendants  of  our  original  civilization.  In  the  last  century 
there  were  men  who  doubted  this  explanation.     Gibbon, 

*  Vide  Symoiids's  "Renaissance  in  Italy,"  v.  lO*?. 

\  Vide  Vernon  Lee's  "  Studies  of  the  Eigliteenth  Century  in  Italy." 


86  Kncjllsli  Literature. 

who  was  prone  to  doubt,  contested  it ;  De  Maistre,  who 
was  inclined  to  conservatism,  eloquently  defended  it.  Even 
Niebuhr  supported  the  notion.* 

We  now  laugh  at  Arcadia  and  its  admirers,  but  we  shoidd 
not  forget  that  it  stood,  as  Mr.  Symonds  says,  for  all  that 
was  imagined  of  the  Golden  Age,  combined  with  refined 
manners  and  polite  society.  It  was  an  aristocratic  region, 
inhabited  only  by  poets,  knights,  and  lovely  ladies  ;  and, 
now  we  have  learned  to  look  upon  it  as  a  feudal  territory,  we 
see  that  the  Golden  Age  of  the  future  must  be  democratic. 
Yet,  with  all  its  shortcomings,  Arcadia  kept  alive  a  gra- 
cious ideal  of  honor  and  sentiment.  Surely  this  merit 
should  not  be  forgotten.  It  did  good  service,  for  one 
thing,  in  refining  literature.  Mr.  Gosse's  interesting  article 
in  the  Cornhill,  some  time  in  the  year  1881,  on  the  match- 
less Orinda,  will  well  illustrate  its  most  flourishing  condi- 
tion in  England,  though  continual  reference  to  it  is  to 
be  found  in  the  Spectator,  Rambler,  etc.  Sanazzaro  in 
his  "  Eclogfe  Piscatoriae,"  I  may  say  incidentally,  "  hath 
changed  the  scene  in  this  kind  of  poetry  from  woods  and 
lawns  to  the  barren  beach  and  boundless  ocean :  introduces 
sea-calves  in  the  room  of  kids  and  lambs,  sea-mews  for  the 
lark  and  the  linnet,  and  presents  his  mistress  Avith  oysters 
instead  of  fruits  and  flowers."  f  His  "Arcadia"  found 
imitators  in  Spain  and  Portugal,  and  in  France.  The  Por- 
tuguese imitation,  Montemayor's  "  Diana  Enamorada,"  X 

*  Vide  Tylor's  "  Primitive  Culture,"  chap.  ii. 

f  Steele,  in  Guardian,  No.  28. 

X  In  "Don  Quixote,"  the  niece  said:  "Pray,  order  the  'Diana  Enamo- 
rada' ...  to  be  burned  with  the  rest,  for  should  my  uncle  be  cured  of 
this  distemper  of  chivalry,  he  may  possibly,  by  reading  such  books,  take  it 
into  his  head  to  turn  shepherd  and  wander  through  tlie  woods  and  folds, 
singing  and  playing  on  a  i)ip(';  and  what  would  be  still  worse,  turn  poet, 
which  they  say  is  an  incurable  and  contagious  disease,"  But  the  book 
was  saved. 


EnglUh  Literature.  87 

contained  more  plot  than  the  Italian  "  Arcadia,"  and  was 
also  followed  by  Sidney.  The  romances,  which  also  con- 
tributed to  the  formation  of  the  heroic  novels,  lay  at 
hand  ;  they  were  really  a  part  of  the  inheritance  Avhich 
modern  Euroj)e  received  from  the  Middle  Ages.  The  first 
and  the  most  famous  of  those  in  prose  was  the  "  Amadis 
of  Gaul,"  written,  it  is  conjectured,  by  a  Portuguese  who 
died  in  1403  or  1404,  one  Lobeira,  a  busy  student  of 
old  romances  *  about  Charlemagne  and  Arthur.  This 
was  translated  into  Spanish  about  1500,  and  from  that 
language  into  French  in  1540.  In  Spain  this  novel  really 
established  a  long  line  of  knightly  prose  romance.  In 
France  it  became  exceedingly  popular,  and  it  was  put 
into  English  from  the  French  version  in  1567.  You  will 
remember  that  "  Amadis  de  Gaule  "  is  one  of  Don  Quix- 
ote's books,  saved  from  burning  by  the  priest  and  the 
barber.  Montaigne,  it  is  curious  to  note,  says,  "  As  to  the 
'  Amadises,'  and  such  kind  of  stuff,  they  had  not  the 
credit  to  take  me,  so  much  as  in  my  childhood.  And  I 
will  moreover  say  (whether  boldly  or  rashly),  that  this 
old,  heavy  soul  of  mine  is  now  no  longer  delighted  with 
Ariosto,  no,  nor  with  the  good  fellow  Ovid  ;  his  facility 
and  invention,  with  which  I  was  formerly  so  ravished,  are 
now  of  no  relish,  and  I  can  hardly  have  the  patience  to  read 
him"  (bk.  ii.  chap.  x.). 

In  England  Sidney's  "  Arcadia  "  had  no  direct  followers, 
with  the  exception  of  at  least  two  brief  continuations;  biit 
in  France  the  romances  of  this  kind  became  the  regular 
form  of  the  prose  fiction  of  the  time.  In  1608  appeared 
the  first  part  of  Honoie  d'Urfe's  "  Astraea,"  translated  in|;o 

*  The  old  French  romances  doubtless  did  good  service  in  encouraging 
the  popular  enthusiasm  for  the  Crusades,  which  in  their  turn  gave  new 
material  to  the  romances.  Vide  Palgrave's  "  History  of  England  and  Nor- 
mandv,"  iv.  4'.)ti. 


88  KikjII^Il  Literature. 

English  in  1657;  this  was  succeeded  by  the  heroic  romances 
by  Gomberville,  Calprenede,  and  Mile,  de  Scudery.  These 
novels  are,  in  the  first  place,  now  absolutely  unreadable  ; 
and  if  their  writers  had  anything  to  communicate,  it  could 
hardly  fail  to  be  diluted  by  the  enormous  amount  of  pad- 
ding which  was  required  to  fill  up  the  vast  bulk  of  these 
colossal  stories.  Gomberville's  "  Pharamond,"  for  instance, 
appeared  in  French  in  1661,  and  was  translated  into  Eng- 
lish a  few  years  later.  This  translation  contains  seven 
hundred  and  fifty-eight  folio  pages,  wdth  over  nine  hun- 
dred words  on  each  page — say  seven  hundred  thousand 
words  in  all.  And  this  is  but  one  of  many.  In  these  ex- 
cessively long-winded  stories  we  find  plenty  of  love-making 
of  a  very  polite  kind,  and  much  fighting.  Problems  of 
love  -  casuistry  are  continually  discussed  ;  and,  more  than 
this,  many  of  them  were  written  about  the  author's  con- 
temporaries, who  were  turned  into  Greeks  or  Romans  or 
Carthaginians;  and  they  went  through  a  travesty  of  ancient 
history  while  talking  after  the  manner  of  those  friends 
whom  the  author  wished  to  embalm.  Thus  Conde  appears 
in  one  of  Mile,  de  Scudery's  novels,  and  others  are  now 
interpreted  by  the  curious.  Yet  for  the  most  part  they 
described  simply  adventures  in  cloudland,  and  are  full  of 
gallantry  and  a  sort  of  chivalrous  elegance. 

These  were  admired  in  France  in  the  fii'st  half  of  the 
seventeenth  century,  but  by  1660  they  began  to  sink  to 
their  proper  place  in  the  general  estimation.  The  influence 
of  Boileau  and  Malherbe  was  cruelly  unfavorable  to  the 
natural  development  of  French  literature,  perhaps,  but  Boi- 
leau's  satires  put  the  finishing  blow  to  these  romances, 
which  then  found  their  warmest  admirers  across  the  Chan- 
nel. When  they  were  exiled  from  France,  they  carried 
influence  from  that  country  into  England,  as  did  the 
emigres  into  the  rest  of  Europe  a  century  later. 


Englisli  Literature.  89 

That  it  takes  time  for  a  fashion  to  spread  is  as  true  in 
literature  as  it  is  in  millinery,  and  it  is  by  no  means  un- 
usual to  be  able  to  follow  the  course  of  a  literary  move- 
ment as  one  does  that  of  a  northeast  storm.  To  take 
examples  from  current  history,  Dickens  is  already  some- 
what old-fashioned  in  England  ;  no  one  there  writes  stories 
now  about  the  jollity  of  Christmas,  or  of  the  red-cheeked 
benevolence  which  he  was  fond  of  describing.  When  we 
come  across  a  trace  of  his  mannei'ism  in  the  work  of  those 
who  were  his  contemporaries,  we  detect  a  certain  antiquity 
in  it ;  yet  only  now  is  Dickens  imitated  in  France.  No  one 
can  read  Daudet  without  perceiving  how  much  he  owes  to 
Dickens  ;  and  we  are  surer  to  find  traces  of  his  influence 
in  this  country  than  in  England,  where  the  writers  have 
befoi'e  them  many  newer  models. 

In  England  the  classical  French  stage  was  first  fairly 
imitated  by  Addison's  "  Cato "  (1713),  which  Voltaire 
called  the  first  reasonable  play  ever  written  in  England  ; 
and  yet,  while  English  writers  wei'e  discussing  the  laws 
of  the  classic  stage,  and  pondering  the  question  of  the 
unities,  Milton  had,  one  may  almost  say,  written  a  Greek 
play,  the  "  Samson  Agonistes  "  (1671),*  which  his  contem- 

*  It  is  curious  to  notice  that  Milton  published  his  "  Comus  "  in  1634, 
just  after  Prynne's  "  Histrio-Mastix"  appeared  (1633),  with  its  denuncia- 
tion of  masques.  May  not  his  "  Samson  Agonistes  "  have  been  meant  as 
in  some  sort  a  contribution  to  the  discussion  concerning  plays  ?  He  re- 
ferred in  his  argument  to  the  question  of  the  unities,  and  spoke  of  Greek 
and  Italian  models.  He  distinctly  reproved  indiscriminate  opposition  to 
the  stage.  "  The  apostle  Paul  himself,"  he  says,  "  thought  it  not  unwor- 
thy to  insert  a  verse  of  Euripides  into  the  text  of  Holy  Scripture ;  and 
Parsus,  commenting  on  the  Revelation,  divides  the  whole  book  as  a  trag- 
edy, into  acts,  distinguished  each  by  a  chorus  of  heavenly  harpings  and  a 
song  between.  Men  of  highest  dignity  have  labored  not  a  little  to  be 
thought  able  to  compose  a  tragedy."  He  mentions  Dionysius  the  elder, 
Augustus  Ca3sar,  Seneca  the  philosopher.     "  Gregory  Nazianzen,  a  father 


90  English  Literature. 

poraries  wholly  ignored.  After  all,  they  were  in  a  great 
measure  right  ;  for  as  a  dramatic  composition  the  work  is 
lifeless,  and,  moreover,  as  Milton  said  in  his  preface,  it  was 
not  intended  for  the  stage.  Its  value  to  us  consists  in  the 
intensity  of  its  expression  of  a  state  of  things  which  had 
no  pathos  to  the  literary  men  of  his  time.  However,  we 
may  agree  with  Voltaire  so  far  as  to  say  that  reason  had 
but  little  place  in  the  composition  of  the  heroic  plays. 
Let  us  take,  for  example,  this  from  Lee's  "  Lucius  Junius 
Brutus."  It  is  a  bit  of  dialogue  between  the  father,  Lu- 
cius Junius  Brutus,  and  his  son,  Titus. 

"  Brutus.  Titus,  as  I  remember, 
You  told  me  you  were  married. 

Titus.  My  lord,  I  did. 

Brutus.  To  Teramiiitu,  Tarquin's  natural  daughter. 

Titus.  Most  true,  iny  lord,  to  that  poor  virtuous  maid, 
Your  Titus,  sir,  your  most  uuhappy  son, 
Is  joined  for  ever. 

Brutus.  No,  Titus,  not  for  ever ; 
Not  but  I  know  the  virgiu's  beautiful, 
For  I  did  oft  converse  her  when  I  seemed 
Not  to  converse  at  all.     Yet  more,  my  son, 
I  think  her  chastely  good,  most  sweetly  framed. 
Without  the  smallest  tincture  of  her  father : 
Yet,  Titus — Ha  !  what,  man  ?     What,  all  in  tears ! 
Art  thou  so  soft  that  only  saying  yet 
Has  dashed  thee  thus  ?     Nay,  then  I'll  plunge  thee  down, 
Down  to  the  bottom  of  this  foolish  stream 
Whose  brink  thus  makes  thee  tremble.     No,  my  son, 
If  .thou  art  mine,  thou  art  not  Teraminta's ; 
Or  if  thou  art,  I  swear  thou  must  not  be — 
Thou  shalt  not  be  hereafter. 

of  the  Church,  thought  it  not  unbecoming  the  sanctity  of  his  person  to 
write  a  tragedy,  which  he  entitled  '  Christ  Suffering.'  "  Thus  Milton  had 
a  word  for  both  sides,  and  he  never  objected  to  being  in  a  minority.  We 
must  remember  that  he  was  a  child  of  the  Renaissance  as  well  as  a 
Puritan. 


Kuijllish  Llttrature.  91 

Titm.  0  the  gods  ! 

Forgive  me,  blood  and  duty,  all  respects 
Due  to  a  father's  name — not  Teraminta's  ? 

Brutus.  No,  by  the  gods  I  swear,  not  Teraminta's  ! 
No,  Titus,  by  th'  eternal  fates  that  hang 
1  hope  auspicious  o'er  the  head  of  Rome, 
I'll  grapple  with  thee  on  this  spot  of  earth 
About  this  theme  till  one  of  us  fall  dead  ; 
I'll  struggle  with  thee  for  this  point  of  honour, 
And  tug  with  Teraminta  for  thy  heart. 
As  I  have  done  for  Home." 

Doubtless  plays  of  this  kiiul  exercised  a  bad  influence 
on  the  mere  acting  of  English  plays,  which  is  not  yet 
dead.  They  seem  to  require  mouthing,  and  the  stage  is 
a  great  supporter  of  tradition,*  The  passage  just  quoted, 
it  is  worth  noticing,  is  in  blank  verse,  and  the  question 
whether  plays  should  be  written  in  couplets  or  in  blank 
verse  was  in  Dryden's  time  much  discussed.  Dryden 
argued  at  great  length  in  favor  of  rhyme,  and  wrote  in 
rhyme  ;  then  he  abandoned  it  and  denounced  it ;  then  he 
tried  it  again  :  but  the  controversy  on  the  matter  I  Avill 
not  now  review.  The  rhymed  play  is  practically  dead, 
but  we  must  remember  that  we  have  in  Milton's  wonder- 
ful blank  verse  an  argument  in  favor  of  that  form  of 
writing  which  Dryden's  contemj^oraries  did  not  have 
until  1667,  and  then  there  was  every  sort  of  prejudice  at 
work  to  render  them  deaf  to  its  harmonies.  They  did 
have,  however,  the  beautiful   blank   verse   of  the   older 

*  Davenant,  who  had  seen  "Hamlet"  acted  by  men  who  had  received 
Sliakspcre's  instruction,  gave  hints  to  Betterton  (1635-1710).  Betterton 
was  praised  by  both  Pepys  and  Steele.  That  the  heroic  plays  induced 
heroic  acting  we  may  learn  from  references  in  the  Spectator,  and  from  the 
delight  with  which  Garrick  was  welcomed.  See,  for  example,  Cumber- 
land's "Memoirs"  (Amer.  ed.),  p.  47.  Reference  is  made  to  his  destruc- 
tion of  "  the  illusions  of  imposing  declamation." 


92  English  Literature. 

dramatists,*  but  their  plays,  it  must  be  borne  in  mind,  now 
seemed  most  rude  and  obsolete,  Evelyn  in  his  Diary, 
Nov.  26,  1661,  says  :  "  I  saw  'Hamlet,  Prince  of  Denmark,' 
played,  but  now  the  old  plays  began  to  disgust  this  re- 
fined age,  since  his  Majesties  being  so  long  abroad."  In 
Pepys  we  find  frequent  references  to  Shakspere.  "  Mac- 
beth "  (Nov.  5,  1664)  he  thought  "a  pretty  good  play," 
and  (Dec,  28,  1666)  "a  most  excellent  play  for  variety," 
and  (Jan.  7,  1667)  "a  most  excellent  play  in  all  respects, 
but  especially  in  divertissement,  though  it  be  a  deep  trag- 
edy ;  which  is  a  strange  perfection  in  a  tragedy,  it  being 
most  proper  here  and  suitable."  With  "  Hamlet  "  (Aug. 
31,  1668)  he  was  "mightily  pleased."  "Midsummer- 
Night's  Dream"  he  thought  (Sept,  25,  1662)  the  most  in- 
sipid, ridiculous  play  "  that  ever  he  saw  in  his  life."  "  The 
Merry  Wives  of  Windsor"  (Aug.  15,  1667)  did  not  please 
him  "  at  all,  no  part  of  it."  "  Othello  "  (Aug,  20,  1666)  he 
had  "  ever  heretofore  esteemed  a  mighty  good  play,  but 
having  so  lately  read  '  The  Adventures  of  Five  Houres,' 
it  seems  a  mean  thing  ;"  and  (Jan.  1,  1664)  "saw  the  so 
much  cried-up  play  of  '  Henry  VIII.  ;'  which,  though  I 
went  with  resolution  to  like  it,  is  so  simple  a  thing  made 
up  of  a  great  many  patches,  that,  besides  the  shows  and 
processions  in  it,  there  is  nothing  in  the  play  good  or 
well  done."  Nov.  7, 1667,  he  saw  the  "  Tempest,"  "  an  old 
play  of  Shakspere's,  .  .  .  the  most  innocent  play  that  ever  I 
saw  ;  and  a  curious  piece  of  musique  in  an  echo  of  half 
sentences,  the  echo  repeating  the  former  half,  while  the 
man  goes  on  to  the  latter,  which  is  mighty  pretty.     The 

*  Blank  verse  had  some  adherents,  however.  In  Evelyn,  Feb.  '24,  1664, 
"  Dr.  Fell,  canon  of  Christ  Church,  preached  before  the  king  on  15  Romans, 
2,  a  very  formal  discourse  and  in  blank  verse,  according  to  his  manner ; 
however,  he  is  a  good  man."  Perhaps  we  have  here  the  explanation  of 
Dr.  Fell's  mysterious  unpopularity. 


English  Literature.  93 

play  has  no    great  wit,  but   yet    good    above    ordinary 
plays." 

Certainly  this  is  not  the  way  in  which  Shakspere  is  re- 
garded by  people  nowadays,*  or  at  least  these  views  are 
not  openly  defended,  although  the  late  German  dramatist 
Benedix,  imitating  Rumelin,  was  even  more  severe  in 
his  denunciations.  Yet  Shakspere  was  frequently  acted, 
and  almost  every  one  of  the  dramatists  of  this  time  found 
pleasure  in  writing  his  plays  over  for  the  new  genera- 
tion. Chapman,  Beaumont  and  Fletcher,  Webster,  and 
others  shared  the  same  fate.  Waller  (1682)  tried  his  hand 
at  rewriting  the  fifth  act  of  the  "Maid's  Tragedy."  In 
the  prologue  he  says  : 

"  Of  all  our  elder  plays 
This  and  Philaster  have  the  loudest  fame ; 
Great  are  their  faults,  and  glorious  is  their  flame. 
In  both  our  English  genius  is  expressed ; 
Lofty  and  bold,  but  negligently  dressed. 

*  *  *  * 

Our  lines  reformed,  and  not  composed  in  haste, 
Polished  like  marble,  would  like  marble  last." 

And  in  the  epilogue  he  says  : 

"  Nor  is't  less  strange,  such  mighty  wits  as  those 
Should  use  a  style  in  tragedy  like  prose. 
Well-sounding  verse,  where  princes  tread  the  stage, 
Should  speak  their  virtue  or  describe  their  rage. 
By  the  loud  trumpet,  which  our  courage  aids, 
We  learn  that  sound  as  well  as  sense  persuades. 
And  verses  are  the  potent  charms  we  use, 
Heroic  thoughts  and  virtue  to  infuse." 

♦  We  may  add  that  it  is  not  the  way  in  which  he  is  now  acted.  Pepys 
saw  of  .Shakspere  "  Hamlet,"  "  Othello,"  "  Romeo  and  Juliet,"  "  Tempest," 
"  Taming  of  the  Shrew,"  "  Macbeth,"  "  Merry  Wives  of  Windsor,"  "  Twelfth 
Night,"  "  Midsummer-Night's  Dream,"  "  Henry  IV.,"  and  "  Henry  VIII." — 
eleven  in  all.  Of  Beaumont  and  Fletcher,  he  saw  twenty-four  plays  ;  Shir- 
ley, nine ;  Ben  Jonson,  five  ;  Ford,  two ;  and  Massinger,  two. 


94  English  Literature. 

Here  is  one  of  the  king's  speeches  : 

"  Courage  our  greatest  failings  does  supply, 
And  makes  all  good,  or  handsomely  we  die. 
Life  is  a  thing  of  common  use ;  by  heaven 
As  well  to  insects  as  to  monarchs  given  ; 
But  for  the  crown,  'tis  a  more  sacred  thing ; 
I'll  dying  lose  it,  or  I'll  live  a  king. 
Come,  Diphilus,  we  must  together  walk 
And  of  a  matter  of  importance  talk." 

Compare  this  with  Aspatia's  sjDeech  in  the  original  play. 
One  of  the  maidens  is  working  the  story  of  "  Theseus 
and  Ariadne  "  in  tapestry.   She  is  dissatisfied  w^ith  Ariadne's 

face  : 

"  Do  it  by  me, 
Do  it  again  by  me,  the  lost  Aspatia, 
And  you  shall  find  all  true  but  the  wild  island. 
Suppose  I  stand  upon  the  sea-beach  now. 
Mine  arms  thus  and  my  hair  blown  with  the  wind, 
Wild  as  that  desert :  and  let  all  about  me 
Be  teachers  of  my  story.     Do  my  face 
(If  ever  thou  hadst  feeling  of  a  sorrow) 
Thus,  thus,  Antiphila  ;  strive  to  make  me  look 
Like  sorrow's  monument ;  and  the  trees  about  me, 
Let  them  be  dry  and  leafless ;  let  the  rocks 
Groan  with  continual  surges  ;  and  behind  me 
Make  all  a  desolation."  * 


*  I  must  apologize  to  Mr.  Lowell  for  repeating  here  what  he  has  said 
more  forcibly  in  his  article  on  Dryden.  He  there  quotes  the  passage  given 
above  to  point  the  same  moral,  but  there  are  no  other  lines  in  the 
play  with  half  their  beauty.  Even  Theobald,  the  original  hero  of  the 
"Dunciad,"in  the  very  middle  of  the  last  century,  was  sTruck  by  them. 
In  his  edition  of  Beaumont  and  Fletcher  (1750),  i.  32,  note,  he  writes: 
"This  is  one  of  those  Passages,  where  the  Poets,  rapt  into  a  glorious  en- 
thusiasm, soar  on  the  rapid  wings  of  Fancy.  Enthusiasm,"  he  adds,  "I 
would  call  the  very  essence  of  Poetry."  Is  it  any  wonder  that  Theobald 
was  detested  by  his  contemporaries  V 


English  Literature.  95 

How  does  that  passage  compare  with  such  a  jingle  as 

this? 

"Evadiie's  husband  'tis  a  fault 
To  love,  a  blemish  to  my  thought ; 
Yet  twisted  with  my  life,  and  I, 
That  cannot  faultless  live,  will  die ! 
Oh  !  that  some  hungry  beast  would  come 
And  make  himself  Aspatia's  tomb. 
If  none  accept  me  for  a  prey 
Death  must  be  found  some  other  way. 
In  colder  regions  men  compose 
Poison  with  art ;  but  here  it  grows. 
Not  long  since,  walking  in  the  field, 
My  nurse  and  I,  we  there  beheld 
A  goodly  fruit  which  tempted  me. 
I  would  have  pluck'd  ;  but  trembling,  she, 
Whoever  eat  those  berries,  cried, 
In  less  than  half  an  hour  dy'd. 
Some  god  direct  me  to  that  bough. 
On  which  these  useful  berries  grow." 

Shakspere  was  treated  in  the  same  way.  Otway  worked 
over  "  Romeo  and  Juliet "  into  a  play  of  ancient  Rome, 
which  he  called  the  "  History  and  Fall  of  Caius  Marius" 
(1G80)  ;  but  in  justice  to  our  ancestors,  let  it  be  said  that 
both  this  play  and  Waller's  revision  were  failures.  The 
fact  was,  that  the  stage  was  dying  ;  the  only  way  in  which 
the  drama  can  exist  is  as  a  mirror  of  life.  In  the  hands 
of  the  Elizabethan  dramatists  it  did  reflect  the  energy  of 
an  awakening  nation,  Marlowe  and  Shakspere  saw  about 
them  great  dreams  of  conquest,  plans  of  discovery,  joy  in 
the  new  learning,  the  consciousness  of  religious  freedom  ; 
and  these  things  they  reflected  in  their  plays.  The  great 
poet  is  the  man  who  sees  the  vast  currents  of  thought 
which  mark  his  time,  without  having  his  eyes  blinded  by 
the  petty  circumstances  which  dim  our  eyes  to  the  higher 
vision.     The  critic,  it  may  be  said,  is  a  sort  of  stammering 


96  English  Literature. 

guide  who  manages  to  get  a  glimpse  of  what  the  poet 
sees.  Those  writers  who  maintain  that  Bacon  was  Shak- 
spere  might  as  well  affirm  that  Achilles  was  Homer.* 
They  forget  the  very  essential  quality  of  a  poet,  which 
is  to  see  the  animating  principles  of  things  more  clearly 
even  than  those  who  are  taking  an  active  part  in  them. 
That  the  possession  of  knowledge  chills  the  ardor  of  the 
poet  we  see  by  comparing  the  second  part  of  Goethe's 
"  Faust,"  the  great  poem  of  this  age,  which  is  animated 
by  a  sort  of  scientific  fervor,  with  the  first  part,  which 
he  wrote  from  his  impressions  as  a  poet. 

When  society  becomes  divided,  when  the  social  scheme 
grows  confused,  and  religious  freedom  is  turned  into  sec- 
tarianism, and  patriotism  into  partisanship,  the  drama, 
which  at  its  best  reflects  only  a  brightly  glowing  light, 
fades  away.  The  absence  of  a  single  informing  spirit  is 
seen  by  the  condition  of  tragedy  in  Dryden's  time,  and, 
for  that  matter,  since.  In  the  heroic  plays  which  he 
wrote,  an  attempt  was  made  to  let  the  single  passion  of 
love  suffice  as  an  animating  principle.  In  the  "  Indian 
Emperor  "  we  have  a  mass  of  conflicting  loves  before  us  : 
Cortez  falls  in  love  with  Montezuma's  daughter  ;  Monte- 
zuma, with  Almeria ;  Almeria  with  Cortez,  and  this  is  a 
fair  sample  of  the  rest.  In  other  plays  he  wrote  in  sup- 
port of  mere  temporary  interests  :  such  was  "  Amboyna," 
1673,  a  wretched  piece  of  work,  designed  simply  to  in- 
flame the  English  against  the  Dutch,  with  whom  war  had 
shortly  before  been  declared.  It  represented  some  atroci- 
ties that  had  been  committed  fifty  years  before  ;  and  yet 
even  here  the  heroic  sentiment  prevailed,  and  the  whole 
crime  is  ascribed  to  an  unholy  love.  If  the  love  of  these 
characters  is  heroic,  what  can  be  said  of  their  heroism  ? 

*  If  Bacon  was  Shakspere,  who  was  Marlowe? 


English  Literature.  97 

Just  as  poor  actors  crack  their  voice'  in  trying  to  make 
impressive  what  a  really  accomplished  player  would  utter 
calmly,  so  did  the  writers  of  this  time  let  their  heroes 
break  out  in  every  form  of  extravagance.  Some  of  these 
I  have  quoted  in  an  earlier  part  of  this  book,  and  others 
may  be  added.  Take  this,  for  instance,  from  the  "  Con- 
quest of  Granada."     Almanzgr  says  : 

"  Cut  piecemeal  in  this  cause, 
From  every  wound  I  should  new  vigor  take : 
And  every  limb  should  new  Alnianzors  make;" 

or  this  from  Crown's  "  Juliana  "  (Crown,  Mr.  Lowell  says, 
Avas  once  a  student  in  Harvard  College.  He  was  a  Nova 
Scotian  by  birth)  : 

"  Come,  villains,  level  me  right  against  the  clouds, 
And  then  give  fire,  discharge  my  flaming  soul, 
Against  such  saucy  destinies  as  those 
As  dare  thus  basely  of  my  life  dispose ; 
Then  from  the  clouds  rebounding  I  will  fall, 
And  like  a  clap  of  thunder  tear  you  all." 

As  Addison  said  in  the  Spectator,  No.  40  :  "  As  our  heroes 
are  generally  lovers,  their  swelling  and  blustering  upon 
the  stage  very  much  recommends  them  to  the  fair  part  of 
their  audience.  The  ladies  are  wonderfully  pleased  to  see 
a  man  insulting  kings,  or  affronting  the  gods,  in  one  scene, 
and  throwing  himself  at  the  feet  of  his  mistress  in  an- 
other." 

These  inventions  were  the  work  of  what  its  owners 
called  icit,  and  of  their  exclusive  possession  of  that  quality 
they  spoke  with  the  precise  self-complacency  which  we 
show  when  we  talk  about  the  spirit  of  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury ;  and  we  may  say,  in  general,  that  the  disposition  to 
dilate  upon  the  admirable  qualities  of  the  present  age  is 
no  more  a  healthy  sign  in  the  public  at  large  than  is  boast- 
ing in  private  life,  and,  moreover,  it  is  most  comnaon  when 

5 


98  English  Literature. 

second-rate  work  is  performed.  It  is  not  when  a  soldier 
is  charging  the  enemy  that  he  brags  about  his  bravery, 
and  it  is  not  when  great  work  is  doing  in  literature  that 
writers  take  time  to  stop  and  call  attention  to  their  wit,  as 
they  did  in  Dryden's  time,  or  to  their  general  intelligence, 
as  we  do  now. 

It  would  be  unfair  to  ascribe  the  tendency  in  current 
literature  to  deal  with  scarcely  anything  but  love-stories 
to  the  heroic  plays  :  other  causes,  which  I  need  not  enu- 
merate, have  contributed  to  this  result ;  but  yet  the  exag- 
gerated value  given  to  the  manifestation  of  passion  which 
we  find  in  the  plays  of  that  time  doubtless  intensified  this 
natural  tendency.  In  Dryden,  Lee,  and  Otway — in  their 
serious  pieces,  that  is — we  find,  as  I  have  said,  that  love  is 
the  only  great  animating  principle.  In  the  "  Conquest 
of  Granada,"  the  "  Indian  Emperor,"  "  Aureng-Zebe," 
"  Venice  Preserved,"  the  "  Orphan,"  "  Tyrannic  Love," 
we  find  more  prominent  than  anything  the  impossible 
love  -  making.  In  the  works  of  the  greatest  authors  we 
find  that  life  is  regarded  as  a  more  serious  and  complex 
thing.  Shakspere  shows  us  other  passions,  ambition,  jeal- 
ousy, constancy,  misanthropy,  etc.;  the  dramatists  who 
lived  with  him  or  followed  him,  like  Chapman,  even  Beau- 
mont and  Fletcher,  do  not  confine  themselves  to  this  one 
emotion  ;  and  in  Scott,  what  is  poorest  is  the-love-making 
of  his  tepid  heroes  and  heroines.  But  in  the  last  century 
we  find  some  of  the  most  important  of  the  writers,  such  as 
Richardson — although,  as  Ave  shall  see,  he  in  general  ex- 
presses a  very  violent  reaction  from  the  artificial  literature 
of  this  time — still  celebrating  the  power  of  love,  and  the 
domestic  tragedy  carried  down  the  same  tradition,  as  in 
the  "  Stranger,"  for  instance,  and  in  the  poorer  work  of 
later  days. 

However  this  may  be,  the  love  that  was  represented  in 


English  Literature.  99 

these  heroic  plays  was  a  singular  thing,  as  was  not  un- 
natural in  view  of  its  origin  in  the  later  tales  of  chivalry, 
and  its  lack  of  harmony  with  the  condition  of  society. 
What  this  was  may  be  seen  in  the  comedies,  which  I  shall 
not  treat  at  length.  At  some  other  time  it  may  be  possi- 
ble to  point  out  the  curious  antithesis  between  comedy  and 
ideal  poetry,  and  to  show  how  the  two  have  always  ap- 
peared in  sharp  contrast  at  the  times  when  literature  has 
flourished.  The  magnificent  farce  of  Aristophanes  coin- 
cided in  time  with  the  glory  of  JEschylus  and  his  success- 
ors ;  Moliere,  as  Mr.  Symonds  says  ("  Renaissance  in 
Italy,"  V.  309),  "portrayed  men  as  they  are  before  an 
audience  which  welcomed  Racine's  pictures  of  men  as  the 
age  conceived  they  ought  to  be."  But  in  the  drama  of 
the  Restoration  we  see  no  such  division  of  labor.  The 
tragedy  is,  above  all  things,  unreal,  and  the  comedy  takes 
its  revenge  by  exaggerating  reality.  In  contrast  with  the 
metaphysical  gallantry  of  the  heroic  plays,  we  have  un- 
paralleled grossness.  In  neither  branch  do  we  see  the 
main  object  of  the  stage  —  "to  show  the  very  age  and 
body  of  the  time,  his  foi'm  and  pressure."  Artistically, 
the  wrong  was  equal  on  each  side,  but  the  distastef  ulness 
of  the  comedy  must  be  our  excuse  for  passing  it  by.  An 
excellent  discussion  of  its  main  qualities  is  to  be  found  in 
Beljanie's  admirable  book,  "  Le  Public  et  les  Hommes  des 
Lettres,"  Paris,  1881,  to  which  I  have  frequently  referred. 
That  the  tragedians  of  the  Restoration  felt  their  in- 
capacity for  doing  good  work  can  hardly  be  aflirmed.* 
Nahum  Tate,  the  same  who  wrote,  with  Dryden's  aid,  the 
second  part  of  "  Absalom  and  Achitophel,"  rewrote  "  King 

*  Dryden,  in  the  preface  to  "  An  Evening's  Love,"  Scott's  ed.,  vol.  iii., 
p.  218,  said  :  "I  liad  thought  ...  to  have  shown  ...  in  what  we  may 
justly  claim  precedence  of  Shakspere  and  Fletcher,  namely,  in  heroic 
plays." 


lOO  English  Literature. 

Lear"  as  his  contribution  to  the  general  polishing  of  Shak- 
spere.  The  last  act  he  wholly  rewrote,  and  he  gave  the  play 
a  happy  ending.  Lamb,  in  his  "Essay  on  the  Tragedies 
of  Shakespeare  "  (iii.  102)  :  "  Tate  has  put  his  hook  in 
the  nostrils  of  this  Leviathan,  for  Garrick  and  his  follow- 
ers, the  show-men  of  the  scene,  to  draw  the  mighty  beast 
about  more  easily,  A  happy  ending  ! — as  if  the  living 
martyrdom  that  Lear  had  gone  through, — the  flaying  of 
his  feelings  alive, — did  not  make  a  fair  dismissal  from  the 
stage  of  life  the  only  decorous  thing  for  him.  If  he  is  to 
live  and  be  happy  after,  if  he  could  sustain  this  world's 
burden  after,  why  all  this  pudder  and  preparation, — why 
torment  us  with  all  this  unnecessary  sympathy  ?  As  if 
the  childish  pleasure  of  getting  his  gilt  robes  and  sceptre 
again  could  tempt  him  to  act  over  again  his  misused  sta- 
tion ! — as  if  at  his  years,  and  with  his  experience,  any- 
thing was  left  but  to  die  !" 

Li  order  that  we  may  see  the  faults  of  our  ancestors 
in  their  proper  light,  I  will  quote  a  few  lines  from  this 
amended  fifth  act,     Albany  says  : 

"  To  your  majesty  we  do  resign 
Your  kingdom,  save  what  part  yourself  conferred 
To  us  in  marriage. 

Lear.  Is't  possible  ? 

Let  the  spheres  stop  their  course,  the  sun  make  halt, 
The  winds  be  hushed,  the  seas  and  fountains  rest ; 
All  nature  pause  and  listen  to  the  change  ;" 

and  later,  Lear  says  : 

"  Cordelia  then  shall  be  a  queen,  mark  that: 
Cordelia  shall  be  a  queen  ;  winds,  catch  the  sound, 
And  bear  it  on  your  rosy  wings  to  heaven. 
Cordelia  is  a  queen." 

And  as  for  Lear's  future,  it  is  assured  as  follows ;  he  says 
to  Gloster : 


English  Literature.  loi 

"  No,  Gloster,  .  .  . 
Thou,  Kent  and  I,  retired  to  some  close  cell 
Will  gently  pass  our  short  reserves  of  time 
In  calm  reflection  on  our  fortune's  past, 
Cheer'd  with  relation  of  the  prosperous  reign 
Of  this  celestial  pair ;  thus  our  remains 
Shall  in  an  even  course  of  thoughts  be  passed, 
Enjoy  the  present  hour  and  fear  the  last." 

And  in  the  final  speech  of  the  play,  as  the  green  curtain 
was  rolling  down,  Edgar  tells  Cordelia  that 

"  Thy  bright  example  shall  convince  the  world 
(Whatever  storms  of  fortune  are  decreed) 
That  truth  and  virtue  shall  at  last  succeed." 

These  alterations  of  Shakspere  would,  perhaps,  seem 
more  curious  to  us,  if  even  we  treated  Shakspere  as  a  man 
who  knew  anything  about  the  writing  of  plays.  But  the 
text  which  he  left  is  mauled  and  tossed  about  by  different 
actors,  as  if  he  were  a  sort  of  general  theatrical  provider, 
from  whom  a  bit  here  and  there  could  be  taken,  as  one 
gets  dresses  or  side-scenes  from  the  people  who  let  those 
things.  Colley  Gibber's  revision  of  "  Richard  III."  still 
holds  the  stage,  with  its 


and, 
and, 


"  Off  with  his  head  !  so  much  for  Buckingham  !" 
"  Now,  by  St.  Paul,  the  work  goes  bravely  on ;" 
"  Richard's  himself  again." 


And  as  for  "  Hamlet,"  who  has  ever  seen  Fortinbras  come 
in,  bringing  with  him  a  flavor  of  practical  life,  as  if  a  win- 
dow were  opened  and  fresh  air  were  let  into  a  sick-room  ? 
Dryden  lent  Ms  hand  to  an  alteration  of  the  "  Tempest," 
and  his  version  of  "  Antony  and  Cleopatra,"  or  "  All  for 
Love,"  as  he  called  it,  is  perhaps  his  best  play.  As  singular 
as  any  is  the  play,  "  The  State  of  Innocence  and  Fall  of 


102  English  Literature. 

Man,"  a  dramatization  of  Milton's  "  Paradise  Lost."  Cer- 
tainly, to  our  ears,  there  is  something  unpardonable  in  the 
notion  of  clipping  Milton's  fine  lines  into  the  fashion  of  the 
couplet,  as  when  Lucifer  says  : 

"  Is  this  the  seat  our  conqueror  has  given  ? 
And  this  the  climate  we  must  change  for  heaven  ? 
These  regions  and  this  realm  my  wars  have  got ; 
This  mournful  empire  is  the  loser's  lot : 
In  liquid  burning,  or  on  dry,  to  dwell, 
Is  all  the  sad  variety  of  hell." — I.  1. 

Or  when  Lucifer  (i.,  1)  says  : 

"  So,  now  we  are  ourselves  again  an  host, 
Fit  to  tempt  fate,  once  more,  for  what  we  lost ; 
To  o'erleap  the  ethereal  fence,  or  if  so  high 
We  cannot  climb,  to  undermine  his  sky, 
And  blow  him  up,  who  justly  rules  us  now. 
Because  more  strong." 

Or,  act  ii.,  scene  1,  after  an  interlude,  in  which,  accord- 
ing to  the  stage-directions,  were  expressed  the  sports  of 
the  devils  :  "  as  flights  and  dancing  in  grotesque  figures  ; 
and  a  song  expressing  the  change  of  their  condition;  what 
they  enjoyed  before,  and  how  they  fell  bravely  in  battle, 
having  deserved  victory  by  their  valour,  and  what  they 
would  have  done  if  they  had  conquered."  We  cannot 
help  wishing  that  Dryden  had  composed  this  song.  Then 
Adam,  "  as  newly  created,  laid  on  a  bed  of  moss  and  flow- 
ers by  a  rock,"  begins  thus  : 

"  What  am  I  ?  or  from  whence  ?  .  For  that  I  am 
I  know, because  I  think."     {Coffito,  ergo  sum.) 

There  is  no  need  of  going  on  with  this.  This  cold- 
blooded way  of  looking  at  Dryden's  poem  reminds  us  of 
the  way  in  Avhich  a  great  many  foreign  critics  speak  of  Mil- 
ton himself,  and  there  would  be  nothing  easier  than  to  turn 
the  "  Paradise  Lost  "  into  abject  ridicule.     In  spite  of  this 


English  Literature.  103 

curious  compliment — for  complimentary  this  treatment  of 
tlie  great  epic  was  meant  to  be — Dry  den  had  a  great  ad- 
miration for  Milton  ;  the  cool  admiration,  I  mean,  which 
one  has  for  a  contemporary  of  whom  one  wholly  disap- 
proves. His  inscription  beneath  the  portrait  of  Milton,  in 
Lord  Somers's  edition,  proves  this  : 

"  Three  poets,  in  three  distant  ages  born, 
Greece,  Italy,  and  England  did  adorn : 
The  first  in  loftiness  of  thought  surpassed ; 
The  next  in  majesty ;  in  both  the  last. 
The  force  of  nature  could  no  further  go, 
To  make  the  third,  she  joined  the  other  two." 

Sundry  remarks  of  his  in  conversation  are  quoted,  and 
here  and  there  in  his  writings  he  expressed  warm  admira- 
tion for  his  greater  contemporary.  Yet  his  admiration 
was  tempered  by  very  evident  contempt  for  Milton's  in- 
ability or  unwillingness  to  adapt  himself  to  the  time  in 
which  he  lived.  Still  more  imjiortant  than  Dryden's  per- 
sonal feeling  is  the  knowledge  of  the  opinion  of  Dryden's 
time,  the  general  opinion  of  men  of  letters,  concerning  Mil- 
ton. Every  prejudice  ran  against  him,  as  a  Puritan  and  a 
defender  of  regicide,  and  it  would,  perhaps,  not  be  an 
exaggeration  to  say  that  to  those  who  were  interested  in 
literature  his  blank  verse  must  have  sounded  very  much 
as  these  lines  may  sound  to  all  but  the  firmest  adherents  of 
Walt  Whitman  ("  Leaves  of  Grass,"  p.  161,  new  edition)  : 

"  Here  shall  you  trace  in  flowing  operation, 
In  every  state  of  practical  busy  movement,  the  rills  of  civilization : 
Materials  here  under  your  eye  shall  change  their  shape  as  if  by  magic, 
The  cotton  shall  be  picked  almost  in  the  very  field  ; 
Shall  be  dried,  cleaned,  ginn'd,  baled,  spun  into  thread  and  clotli  before 

you  ; 
You  shall  see  hands  at  work  at  all  the  old  processes  and  all  the  new 

ones ; 


104        ,  English  Literature. 

You  shall  see  the  various  grains  and  how  flour  is  made  and  then  bread 
baked  by  the  bakers  ; 

You  shall  see  the  crude  ores  of  California  and  Nevada  passing  on  and 
on  till  they  become  bullion  ; 

You  shall  watch  how  the  printer  sets  type,  and  learn  what  a  composing- 
stick  is","  etc. 

In  a  panegyric  of  Lee's,  although  one  must  remember 
that  much  of  the  language  of  panegyrics  was  no  more  an 
affidavit  than  are  epitaphs,  he  says  : 

•'  Milton  did  the  wealthy  mine  disclose, 
And  rudely  cast  what  you  could  well  dispose  : 
He  roughly  drew,  on  an  old-fashion'd  ground, 
A  chaos ;  for  no  perfect  world  was  found, 
Till  through  the  heap  your  mighty  genius  shined : 
He  was  the  golden  ore  which  you  refined." 

As  a  final  extract  from  "The  State  of  Innocence,"  I 
shall  quote  part  of  Eve's  soliloquy,  after  tasting  the  fatal 
api^le.  You  will  notice  the  coquetry  which  Dryden  has 
introduced  into  the  scene  : 

"  I  love  the  wretch  ;  but  stay,  shall  I  afford 
Him  part?  already  he's  too  much  my  lord. 
'Tis  in  my  power  to  be  a  sovereign  now  ; 
And,  knowing  more,  to  make  his  manhood  bow. 
Empire  is  sweet ;  but  how  if  Heaven  has  spied  ; 
If  I  should  die,  and  He  above  provide 
Some  other  Eve,  and  place  her  in  my  stead  ? 
■     Shall  she  possess  his  love,  when  f^ra  dead  ? 
Xo  ;  he  shall  eat,  and  die  with  me,  or  live : 
Our  equal  crimes  shall  equal  fortune  give." 

Yet,  naturally  enough,  the  whole  opera — for  it  corresponded 
to  that  as  much  as  to  anything  we  know  in  the  world  of 
art  or  literature — is  not  wholly  made  up  of  such  scenes; 
still,  these  will  show  what  things  were  possible  in  those 
days,  just  as  we  may  imagine  some  future  student  quoting 
these  lines  to  show  the  excesses  of  the  present  period  : 


English  Literature.  105 

"  Death  ! 
Plop. 
The  barges  down  in  the  river  flop : 
Flop,  flop, 
Above,  beneath, 
From  the  shmy  branches  the  gray  drips  drop, 
As  they  scraggle  bhick  on  the  thin  gray  sky. 
Where  the  black  cloud  rack-hackles  drizzle  and  fly 
To  the  oozy  waters,  that  lounge  and  flop 
On  the  black  scrag  piles,  where  the  loose  cords  plop. 
As  the  raw  wind  whines  in  the  thin  tree-top, 
Plop,  flop."  * 


The  poem  ends  thus  : 


"  Ugh,  I  knew ! 

Ugh! 

So  what  do  I  care 

And  my  head  is  as  empty  as  air — 

I  can  do, 

I  can  dare. 

Plop,  plop. 

The  barges  flop 

Drip,  drop. 

I  can  dare,  I  can  dare  ! 

And  let  myself  all  run  away  with  my  head 

And  stop. 

Drop 

Dead, 

Plop,  flop, 

Plop." 


*  From  "  A  Tragedy,"  by  Theodore  Marzials,  in  his  "  Gallery  of  Pigeons 
and  Other  Poems,"  p.  85,  Mr.  Stedman,  in  his  "  Victorian  Poets,"  cites  these 
lines  to  show  the  modernness  of  some  later  poets.  He  must  have  found 
it  hard  to  stop  quoting.  Here  is  one  passage,  from  a  poem  called  "  The 
Trout,"  p.  68,  in  which  the  bard  out-Postlethwaites  Postlethwaite : 

"  All  is  a-gray,  and  the  sky's  in  a  glimmer, 
A  glimmer  as  ever  a  sky  should  be ; 
Silvery  gray,  with  a  silvery  shimmer, 
5* 


io6  English  Literature. 

Yet  to  judge  of  any  period  by  its  faults  alone  would  be 
like  forming  an  opinion  of  a  river  by  its  low-water  mark 
alone,  and  would,  moreover,  give  us  a  very  dark  view  of 
any  age.  We  do  not  fix  Homer's  position  by  the  cata- 
logue of  ships,  or  Shakspere's  by  his  extravagant  passages, 
and  the  age  of  Dry  den  desei-ves  the  same  treatment.  In 
general,  the  study  of  the  pathology  of  literature  is  of  use 
as  showing  vividly  some  of  the  tendencies  that  have  pre- 
vailed at  different  times. 

As  examples  of  Dryden's  finer  stjde,  I  will  quote  these 
lines  from  "  Aureng-Zebe  "  (act  iv.  sc.  l)  : 

"  When  I  consider  life,  'tis  all  a  cheat. 
Yet,  fooled  with  hope,  nien  favour  the  deceit, 
Trust  on,  and  think  to-morrow  will  repa_v. 
To-morrow's  falser  than  the  former  day, 
Lies  worse,  and  while  it  saj's,  we  shall  be  blest 
With  some  new  joys,  cuts  off  what  we  possesst. 
Strange  cozenage  !  none  would  live  past  years  again, 
Yet  all  hope  pleasure  in  what  yet  remain, 
And  from  the  dregs  of  life  think  to  receive 
AVhat  the  first,  sprightly  running  could  not  give. 
I'm  tir'd  with  waiting  for  this  chemic  gold. 
Which  fools  us  young  and  beggars  us  when  old.''  * 

Where  shimmers  the  sun  in  the  hazes  a-shimmer, 
The  shimmer  of  I'iver,  oh  !  river  a-shimmer." 

*  Cf.  "Macbeth  "  (act  v.  sc.  5): 

"  To-morrow,  and  to-morrow,  and  to-morrow, 
Creeps  in  this  petty  pace  from  day  to  day, 
To  the  last  syllable  of  recorded  time ; 
And  all  our  yesterdays  have  lighted  fools 
The  way  to  dusty  death.     Out,  out,  brief  candle! 
Life's  but  a  walking  shadow  ;  a  poor  player 
That  struts  and  frets  his  hour  upon  the  stage, 
And  then  is  heard  no  more :  it  is  a  tale 
Told  by  an  idiot,  full  of  sound  and  fury, 
Signifvins  nothing" 


English  Literature.  107 

Or  take  this  from  the  "  Qj^ilipus,"  written  in  conjunction 
with  Lee,  who  wrote  fine  things  amid  his  fustian  : 

"  Thou  coward !  yet 
Art  living?  canst  not,  wilt  not  find  tlie  road 
To  the  great  palace  of  magnificent  death, 
Though  thousand  ways  lead  to  his  thousand  doors 
Which  day  and  night  are  still  unbarred  for  all." 

This  was  written,  you  notice,  in  blank  verse,  and  the  fact 
that  Dryden  finally  made  up  his  mind  in  favor  of  blank 
verse,  and  wrote  in  that  measure,  turned  the  scale  in  favor 
of  abandoning  the  couplets  in  tragedy.  As  Dryden  said, 
in  his  prologue  to  "  Aureng-Zebe "  (1676)  ; 

"  Not  that  it's  worse  than  what  before  he  writ, 
But  he  has  now  another  taste  of  wit ; 
And  to  confess  a  truth  (though  out  of  tiniej. 
Grows  weary  of  his  long-loved  mistress,  rhjTiie. 
Passion's  too  fierce  to  be  in  fetters  bound, 
And  nature  flies  him  like  enchanted  ground. 
What  verse  can  do  he  has  performed  in  this, 
Which  he  presumes  the  most  correct  of  his ; 
But  spite  of  all  his  pride,  a  secret  shame 
Invades  his  breast  at  Shakspere's  sacred  name  : 
Awed,  when  he  hears  his  god-like  Romans  rage, 
He,  in  a  Just  despair,  would  quit  the  stage. 
And,  to  an  age  less  polish'd,  more  unskill'd, 
Does,  with  disdain,  the  foremost  honours  yield." 

He  wearied  of  the  couplet,  and  threw  the  weight  of  his 
authority  on  the  other  side.  It  was,  after  all,  Dryden's 
critical  writings  that  gave  him  a  position  as  a  representa- 
tive writer.  Lee  surpassed  him  in  certain  kinds  of  trage- 
dy; Etherege*  in  comedy;  Otway,  too,  had  a  quality  of 
direct  pathos  which  Dryden  never,  or  but  very  seldom,  ex- 
hibited. 

*  See  an  interesting  article  on  Etherege  in  the  Cornhill  Magazine  for 
March,  1881. 


io8  English  Literature. 

The  impression  which  Dryden  left  on  the  minds  of  his 
contemporaries,  and  the  one  which  still  survives,  is  this  : 
that  he  was  a  man  of  great  ability,  and  a  wonderful  crafts- 
man. If  he  had  been  born  in  more  poetical  times  he  would 
have  brought  to  the  service  of  literature  the  same  ability, 
and  the  sounder  fervor  of  other  men  would  have  kept 
him  from  frittering  away  his  power  over  such  poor  mate- 
rial as  the  heroic  plays.  We  notice  everywhere  in  his 
satirical  and  didactic  poems  his  exceptional  vigor.  I  have 
given  some  examples  of  this,  and  there  are  others  : 

"  Death  in  itself  is  nothing;  bat  we  fear 
To  be  we  know  not  what,  we  know  not  where." 

"  The  secret  pleasure  of  the  generous  act 
Is  the  great  mind's  great  bribe." 

"  Forgiveness  to  the  injured  does  belong ; 
But  they  ne'er  pardon  who  have  done  the  wrong." 

Or  such  poetical  touches  as  we  find  in  the  blank  verse  : 

"  I  feel  death  rising  higher  still  and  higher 
AVithin  my  bosom ;  every  breath  I  fetch 
Shuts  up  my  life  within  a  shorter  compass, 
And,  like  the  vanishing  sound  of  bells,  grows  less 
And  less  each  pulse,  till  it  be  lost  in  air." 

Antony,  in  "  All  for  Love,"  says  : 

"  For  I  am  now  so  sunk  from  what  I  was. 
Thou  find'st  me  at  my  lowest  water-mark. 
The  rivers  that  ran  in  and  raised  my  fortunes 
Are  all  dried  up,  or  take  another  course  : 
What  I  have  left  is  from  my  native  spring ; 
I've  a  heart  still  that  swells  in  scorn  of  Fate, 
And  left  me  to  my  banks." 

Here  is  one  more  picturesque  passage  : 

"  You  ne'er  must  hope  again  to  see  your  princess, 
Except  as  prisoners  view  fair  walks  and  streets, 
And  careless  passengers  going  by  their  grates." 


English  Literature.  109 

Compare  Dryden's  best  lines  with  some  extracts  from 
Lee's  various  plays. 
From  "  QEdipus  :" 

"  May  the  sun  never  dawn, 
The  silver  moon  be  blotted  from  her  orb, 
And  for  an  universal  rout  of  nature 
Through  all  the  inmost  chambers  of  the  sky 
May  there  not  be  one  spark. 
But  gods  meet  gods  and  jostle  in  the  dark." 

This  is  the  sort  of  writing  which  has  given  Lee  his  repu- 
tation for  writing  fustian,  but  he  could  do  better  than  this, 
and  that  he  did  so  is  undeniable,  as  these  extracts  will  show. 
From  "  Theodosius  :" 

"  Leontini.  Thou  art  the  only  comfort  of  my  age  ; 
Like  an  old  tree  I  stand  among  the  storms. 
Thou  art  the  only  limb  that  I  have  left  rae ; 
My  dear  green  branch,  and  how  I  prize  thee,  child. 
Heaven  only  knows !     Why  dost  thou  kneel  and  weep  ?" 

"  Varanes.  Far  be  the  noise 

Of  kings  and  crowds  from  us,  whose  gentle  souls 
Our  kinder  stars  have  steer'd  another  way. 
Free  as  the  forest  birds  we'll  pair  together. 

*  *  *  *  * 

Together  driuk  the  crystal  of  the  stream. 
Or  taste  the  yellow  fruit  which  autumn  yields  ; 
And  when  the  golden  evening  calls  us  home, 
Wing  to  our  downy  nest,  and  sleep  till  morn." 

"  Theodosius.  Oh,  were  I  proof  against  the  darts  of  love, 
And  cold  to  beauty  as  the  marble  lover 
That  lies  without  a  thought  upon  his  tomb. 
Would  not  this  glorious  dawn  of  life  run  through  me, 
And  waken  death  itself  ?" 

"  Varanes.  Though  I  have  lived  a  Persian,  I  will  fall 
As  fair,  as  fearless,  and  as  full  resolved 
As  any  Greek  or  Roman  of  'em  all." 

From  "  Cresar  Bora-ia  :" 


no  English  Literature. 

"  MachiaveUi.  The  dead  are  only  happy  and  the  dying : 
The  dead  are  still,  and  lasting  slumbers  hold  'em : 
He  who  is  near  his  death,  but  turns  about, 
Shuffles  awhile  to  make  his  pillow  easy, 
Then  slips  into  his  shroud  and  sleeps  for  ever." 

And  this, 

"  MachiaveUi.  The  occasion  gives  new  life,  fresh  vigour  to  him  ; 
E'en  at  the  very  verge  of  bottomless  death, 
He  stands  and  smiles  as  careless  and  undaunted 
As  wanton  swimmers  on  a  river's  brink 
Laugh  at  the  rapid  stream." 

From  "  The  Rival  Queens  :" 

"  Alexander.  Oh,  she  is  gone  !  the  talking  soul  is  mute  ! 
She's  hushed,  no  voice  or  music  now  is  heard  ! 
The  power  of  beauty  is  more  still  than  death ; 
The  roses  fade,  and  the  melodious  bird 
That  waked  their  sweets  has  left  them  now  for  ever." 

"  Alexander.  How  dead  !     Hephsestion  dead  !  alas,  the  dear 
Unhappy  youth  ! — But  he  sleeps  happy, 
I  must  wake  for  ever : — This  object,  then, 
This  face  of  fatal  beauty, 
^Yill  stretch  my  lids  with  vast,  eternal  tears." 

From  "  Mithridates  :" 

"  Arm,  arm,  great  Mithridates,  the  big  war 
Comes  with  vast  leaps,  bounding  o'er  all  the  East, 
Which  crouches  to  the  torrent." 

From  "  Sophonisba  :" 

"  Why  do  you  stop  ?     Still  as  a  statue  low 
I  stand,  nor  shall  the  wind  presume  to  blow. 
Speak  and  it  shall  be  night :  not  one  shall  dare 
To  sigh,  tho'  on  the  rack  he  tortured  were, 
Nor  for  his  soul  whisper  a  dying  prayer." 

These  two  extracts  from  "  Mithridates  "  are  also  worthy  of 

note  : 

"  Masinissa.  Grant  me,  ye  gods,  before  the  hand  of  death 
Comes  like  eternal  night  with  her  dark  wing 


English  Literature.  in 

To  bar  the  comfortable  light  for  ever 
From  these  my  aged  eyes  ;  0,  let  me  see 
A  grandchild  of  my  prince's  sacred  blood, 
To  call  him  mine,  to  feel  him  in  my  arms. 
To  hear  his  innocent  talk,  and  see  him  smile, 
While  I  tell  stories  of  his  father's  valour, 
Which  he  in  time  must  learn  to  imitate : 
Grant  me  but  this,  you  gods,  and  make  an  end, 
Soon  as  you  please,  of  this  old  happy  man." 

"  Ziphanes.  Go  then,  thou  setting  star  ;  take  from  these  eyes 

0  take  those  languishing  pale  fires  away, 
And  leave  me  to  the  wide  dark  den  of  death." 

It  seems  incredible  that  a  man  who  wrote  lines  like  these 
could  compose  such  a  passage  as  this : 

"  Wheels,  stones,  and  all  the  subtlest  pains  of  hell. 
With  burning,  reddest  plagues  about  'em  dwell.  - 
About  'em  !  in  'em,  through  'em,  let  'em  run, 
And  flames  with  flames  involved  be  swallowed  down." 

Yet,  while  we  find  occasional  good  lines  in  Dryden's 
plays,  there  is  no  07ie  play,  either  tragedy  or  comedy,  that 
deserves  high  praise.  The  most  interesting  part  of  them 
is  the  prologue,  or  the  introductory  essay,  in  which  he  used 
to  discuss  the  best  method  of  working,  or  some  of  the 
theories  which  were  suggested  by  his  critics  or  by  himself.* 
I  have  given  some  examples,  and  it  would  be  easy  to  find 
many  more.  We  may  leave  this,  however,  and  take  into 
consideration  some  of  the  other  sides  of  the  drama.  In 
the  first  place,  all  the  tragedies  were  on  the  sufferings  of 
kings  ;  and,  as  Dryden  said  in  his  preface  to  the  "  Annus 
Mirabilis,"  in  that  poem  was  "  incomparably  the  best  sub- 
ject I  ever  had,  excepting  only  the  Royal  Family;"  and 

*  He  adopted  the  custom,  doubtless,  from  the  French  tragedians,  espe- 
cially Corneille,  who  wrote  a  preface  to  each  of  his  plays,  explaining  and 
defending  his  views.  The  dedications  to  the  rich  are  the  same  in  both, 
and  for  the  same  reason. 


1 1 2  English  Literature. 

royal  families  were  uniformly  the  subjects  of  these  new 
plays.  This  was  also  the  case  in  the  French  drama.  Yet 
in  the  preface  to  his  "Don  Sanche  "  (1651)  we  find  Cor- 
neille  getting  a  glimpse  of  a  truth  which  has  since  become 
a  truism.  He  says:  "  Tragedy  should  excite  both  pity  and 
fear.  .  .  .  !Now  since  it  is  true  that  the  latter  feeling  is 
only  excited  within  us  when  we  see  our  equals  {seni- 
blahles)  suffering,  when  their  misfortunes  make  us  dread 
like  sufferings  for  ourselves,  is  it  not  true  that  it  might  be 
more  strongly  excited  by  the  sight  of  misfortunes  befall- 
ing people  in  our  own  station  of  life,  whom  we  resemble 
in  every  particular,  than  by  those  which  drive  from  their 
thrones  great  monarchs,  with  whom  we  sympathize  only 
so  far  as  we  are  susceptible  of  the  passions  that  cast 
them  into  this  abyss,  which  cannot  always  be  the  case?" 
And  elsewhere  :  "  I  venture  to  imagine  that  those  who 
limited  this  sort  of  poem  [the  tragedy]  to  illustrious  per- 
sons, did  so  only  because  they  thought  that  the  fortune  of 
kings  and  princes  was  alone  capable  of  such  an  action  as 
the  great  master  of  the  art  prescribes.  However,  when  he 
begins  to  discuss  the  qualities  necessary  for  the  hero  of  a 
tragedy,  he  does  not  touch  upon  his  birth,  and  speaks  simply 
of  his  life  and  character.  He  demands  a  hero  who  shall  be 
neither  vicious  nor  faultless  ;  he  must  be  persecuted  by 
some  one  with  Avhom  he  is  in  close  relations;  he  must  be  in 
danger  of  dying  at  the  hand  of  some  one  whose  duty  it 
should  be  to  save  him  —  and  I  do  not  see  why  all  this 
can  happen  only  to  one  of  royal  birth,  or  that  a  lower 
station  is  exempt  from  these  misfortunes."  Voltaire,  in 
his  preface  to  the  play,  held  up  the  cause  of  conservatism 
by  saying  that  doubtless  very  sad  misfortunes  might  befall 
simple  citizens,  "  but  they  distress  us  much  less  than  those 
which  happen  to  monarchs,  whose  fate  involves  that  of 
nations.     A  citizen  may  be  assassinated  as  Pompey  was, 


Eiiylitih  Literature.  113 

but  the  death  of  Pompey  will  always  have  a  very  diJfferent 
effect  from  that  of  a  private  citizen.  If  you  treat  the 
interests  of  a  bourgeois  in  the  style  of  Mithridates,  you  are 
guilty  of  impropriety  ;  and  if  you  represent  a  terrible  ad- 
venture befalling  an  ordinary  man,  in  a  familiar  style,  this 
diction,  which  suits  the  hero,  ill-becomes  the  incidents." 

The  first  w^-iter  of  any  prominence  who  chose  any  one 
for  his  subject  outside  of  a  royal  family  was  Otway, 
whose  "Orphan"  (I68O)  and  "Venice  Preserved  "  (1682)  1 
long  held  the  stage.  The  language  of  these  plays  is  en- 
tirely different  from  that  of  Dryden's,  and,  as  we  shall 
see,  is  of  itself  worthy  of  attention  ;  but  what  I  wnsh  to 
mention,  first  of  all,  is  the  introduction  of  this  new  hero, 
and  the  abandonment  of  the  king.  This  change  was  an 
indication  of  what  was  going  to  take  place  in  the  next 
century,  and  is  but  one  of  the  instances  which  we  shall 
find  of  the  growth  of  democracy  in  literature.  At  this 
time,  however,  nothing  of  the  sort  was  conjectured,  and 
Otway,  doubtless,  wrote  about  private  people  from  no 
desire  to  revolutionize  letters.  The  poor  man  had  but 
little  chance  to  think  of  anything  but  the  day  before  him, 
or,  more  probably,  the  night  that  was  before  him,  and  he 
manufactured  gross  comedies,  and  w^'ote  two  of  the  most 
memorable  plays  of  the  time. 

These  extracts  may  illustrate  his  manner.     This  is  from 
"  Venice  Preserved  :" 

'■'■Jaffier.  'Tis  now,  I  think,  three  years  we've  lived  together. 

Belvide7-a.  And  may  no  fatal  minute  ever  part  us, 
Till  reverend  grown,  for  age  and  love,  we  go 
Down  to  our  graves,  as  our  last  bed,  together; 
Then  sleep  in  peace  till  an  eternal  morning. 

Jaffier.  When  will  that  be  ? 

Belvidera.  I  hope  long  ages  hence, 

Jaffier.  Have  I  not  hitherto  (I  beg  thee  tell  me 


1 1 4  English  Literature. 

Thy  very  fears)  used  thee  with  tender'st  love? 
Did  e'er  my  soul  rise  up  in  wrath  against  thee  ? 
Did  I  e'er  frown  when  Belvidera  smiled, 
Or,  by  the  least  unfriendly  word,  betray 
Abating  passion  ?     Have  I  ever  wronged  thee  ? 

Bdvkkra.  No. 

Jaffier.  Has  my  heart,  or  have  my  eyes  e'er  wandered 
To  any  other  woman  ? 

Belvidera.  Never,  never — 

I  were  the  worst  of  false  ones,  should  I  accuse  thee." 

Jaffier  blesses  her  : 

"  Then  hear  me,  bounteous  Heaven ; 
Pour  down  your  blessings  on  this  beauteous  head, 
Where  everlasting  sweets  are  always  springing. 
With  a  continual,  giving  hand  :  let  peace, 
Honour,  and  safety  always  hover  round  her; 
Feed  her  with  plenty,  let  her  eyes  ne'er  see 
A  sight  of  sorrow,  nor  her  heart  know  mournings : 
Crown  all  her  days  with  joy,  her  nights  with  rest, 
Harmless  as  her  own  thought ;  and  prop  her  virtue 
To  bear  the  loss  of  one  that  too  much  loved, 
And  comfort  her  with  patience  in  our  parting. 

Belvidera.  How,  parting,  parting  ? 

Jaffier.  Yes,  forever  parting; 

I  have  sworn,  Belvidera,  by  yon  Heaven, 
That  best  can  tell  how  much  I  lose,  to  leave  thee. 
We  part  this  hour  forever. 

Belvidera.  Oh,  call  back 

Your  cruel  blessing;  stay  with  me  and  curse  me !" 

This  from  the  "  Orphan  :" 

"  For  all  is  hushed,  as  Nature  were  retired. 
And  the  perpetual  motion  standing  still : 
So  much  she  from  her  work  appears  to  cease. 
And  every  warring  element's  at  peace. 
All  the  wild  herds  are  in  their  coverts  couch'd ; 
The  fishes  to  their  banks  or  ooze  repair'd. 
And  to  the  murmurs  of  the  waters  sleep; 


'  English  Literature.  1 1 5 

The  feeling  air's  at  rest,  and  feels  no  noise, 
Except  of  some  soft  breaths  among  the  trees, 
Rocking  the  harmless  birds  that  rest  upon  them." 

"  Wished  morning's  come  !  and  now  upon  the  plains 

And  distant  mountains  where  they  feed  the  flocks. 

The  happy  shepherds  leave  tlieir  homely  huts, 

And  with  their  pipes  proclaim  the  new-born  day. 

The  lusty  swain  comes  witli  his  well-fiird  scrip 

Of  healthful  viands,  -which,  when  hunger  calls. 

With  much  content  and  appetite  he  eats. 

To  follow  in  the  fields  his  daily  toil. 

And  dress  the  grateful  glebe,  that  yields  him  fruits, 

The  beasts  that  under  the  warm  hedges  slept, 

And  weathered  out  the  cold  bleak  night,  are  up. 

And  looking  towards  the  neighb'ring  pastures,  raise 

Their  voice,  and  bid  -their  fellow-brutes  good-morning ; 
■  The  cheerful  birds,  too,  in  the  tops  of  trees 

Assemble  all  in  choirs  and  with  their  notes 
'  Salute,  and  welcome  up  the  rising  sun." 

Id.,  iv.  1. 

For  bis  heroics,  vide  "  Orphan,"  iii.  1. 

"  Castalio.  Who's  there  ? 

Ernesto.  A  friend. 

Castalio.  If  thou  art  so,  retire. 

And  leave  this  place,  for  I  would  be  alone. 

Ernesto.  Castalio  !     My  lord,  why  in  this  posture, 
Stretched  on  the  ground  ?     Your  honest,  true  old  servant, 
Your  poor  Ernesto  cannot  see  you  thus ; 
Rise,  1  beseech  you. 

Castalio.  If  thou  art  Ernesto, 

As  by  thy  honesty,  thou  seem'st  to  be, 
Once  leave  me  to  my  folly. 

Ernesto.  I  ca,n't  leave  you, 

And  not  the  reason  know  of  your  disorders. 

Castalio.  Thou  can'st  not  serve  me. 
Ernesto.  Why  ? 

Castalio.  Because  my  thoughts 

Are  full  of  woman ;  thou,  poor  wretch,  art  past  them. 


ii6  English  Literature.  * 

Ernesto.  I  bate  the  sex. 

Castalio.  Then  I'm  thy  friend,  Ernesto. 

I'd  leave  the  world  for  him  that  hates  a  woman. 
Woman,  the  fountain  of  all  human  frailty ! 
What  mighty  ills  have  not  been  done  by  woman  ? 
Who  was't  betrayed  the  capitol?     A  woman. 
Who  lost  Mark  Antony  the  world  ?     A  woman. 
Who  was  the  cause  of  a  long  ten  years'  war, 
And  laid  at  last  old  Troy  in  ashes  ?     Woman, 
Destructive,  damnable,  deceitful  woman  !"  etc. 

Dr.  Johnson  said  of  one  of  his  plays,  the  "  Orphan," 
that  it  was  "  the  work  of  a  man  not  attentive  to  decency, 
nor  zealous  for  virtue  ;  but  of  one  who  conceived  forci- 
bly, and  drew  originally,  by  consulting  nature  in  his  own 
breast." 

This  secret  Ot  way  had,  and  he  shows  a  poetical  quality, 
too,  in  the  "Poet's  Complaint  of  his  Muse,"  "  part  of  which 
I  do  not  understand  ;  and  in  that  which  is  less  obscure  I 
find  little  to  commend.  .  .  .  The  numbers  are  harsh,"  as 
Dr.  Johnson  said,  but  there  is  vigor  in  the  following  open- 
ing lines  of  the  ode  : 

"  To  a  high  hill  where  never  yet  stood  tree, 

Where  only  heath,  coarse  fern,  and  furzes  grow, 

Where,  nipped  by  piercing  air. 
The  flocks  in  tattered  fleeces  hardly  graze, 

Led  by  uncouth  thoughts  and  care. 
Which  did  too  much  his  pensive  mind  amaze, 
A  wandering  bard,  whose  Muse  was  crazy  grown, 
Cloyed  with  the  nauseous  follies  of  the  buzzing  town, 
Came,  look'd  about  him,  sighed,  and  laid  him  down. 
'Twas  far  from  any  path,  but  where  the  earth 
Was  bare  and  naked  all  as  at  her  birth. 
When  by  the  Word  it  first  was  made, 
Ere  God  had  said  : — 
Let  grass,  and  herbs,  and  every  green  thing  grow 
With  fruitful  herbs  after  their  kinds,  and  it  was  so. 


-En  gliah  Liter  a  t  are.  1 1 7 

The  whistling  winds  blew  fiercely  round  his  head ; 

Cold  was  his  lodging,  hard  his  bed ; 

Aloft  his  eyes  on  the  wide  heavens  he  cast, 

Where,  we  are  told,  peace  only  is  found  at  last ; 

And  as  he  did  its  hopeless  distance  see, 

Sighed  deep  and  cried,  '  How  far  is  peace  from  me !'  " 

These  lines  will  never  be  quoted  for  their  harmony,  but 
they  are  curious  as  a  vivid  description  of  scenery,  at  a 
time  when  scenery  was  as  little  studied  as  electricity.  As 
a  specimen  of  the  way  nature  was  frequently  addressed, 
these  lines  may  be  noticed  : 

"Weep  then,  once  fruitful  vales,  and  spring  with  yew  ! 
Ye  thirsty  barren  mountains,  weep  with  dew  ! 

***** 
Let  mournful  cypress,  with  each  noxious  weed, 
And  baneful  venoms,  in  their  place  succeed  ! 
Ye  purling,  querulous  brooks,  o'ercharged  with  grief, 
Haste  swiftly  to  the  sea  for  more  relief,"  etc. 
— John  Tomfret,  a  pastoral,  "  Essay  on  the  Death  of  Queen  Mary,"  1694. 

This,  I  take  it,  is  not  an  unfair  example  of  the  usual 
way  of  regarding  nature  at  this  time.*  As  Otway's  poem 
goes  on,  it  becomes  very  obscure,  but  the  beginning  at 
least  is  fine. 

IV,  To  make  a  change  from  this  subject  to  one  akin  to 
it,  let  us  for  a  moment  look  at  the  songs  of  the  drama  of 
the  Restoration.  Here  we  come  across  a  number  of  in- 
stances of  the  French  influence.  Yet  it  is  worthy  of  no- 
tice that  many  of  the  songs  in  Dryden's  plays  are  transla- 
tions of  French  songs  of  the  sixteenth  century,  the  other 
models,  the  lyrics  of  the  great  English  dramatists,  being 
neglected.     As  an  example  of  the  change,  we  may  com- 

*  For  another  example  of  the  conventional  treatment  of  nature,  see 
Conn-reve's  pastoral,  "The  Mourning  Muse  of  Alexis,"  also  on»the  death 
of  Queen  Mary ;  and  Thackeray's  amusing  comments  on  it,  in  his  "  Eng- 
lish Humourists." 


1 1 8  Emjlish  Literature. 

pare  the  song  which  Rochester  put  into  his  version  of 
Beaumont  and  Fletcher's  "  Valentinian,"  with  the  one  in 
the  original.     Here  is  Rochester's  : 

Kymph. 
"  Injurious  charmer  of  my  vanquished  heart, 
Canst  thou  feel  love,  and  yet  no  pity  know  ? 
Since  of  myself  from  thee  I  cannot  part, 
Invent  some  gentle  way  to  let  me  go ; 
For  what  with  joy  thou  didst  obtain, 

And  I  with  more  did  give, 
In  time  will  make  thee  false  and  vain, 
And  me  unfit  to  live." 
Shepherd. 
"  Frail  angel,  that  wouldst  have  a  heart  forlorn. 
With  vain  pretence  Falsehood  therein  might  lie, 
Seek  not  to  cast  wild  shadows  o'er  your  scorn. 
You  cannot  sooner  change  than  I  can  die  ; 
To  tedious  life  I'll  never  fall, 

Thrown  from  thy  dear-lov'd  breast ; 
He  merits  not  to  live  at  all. 
Who  cares  to  live  unblest." 

Beaumont  and  Fletcher's  song  ran  thus  : 

"  Hear,  ye  ladies  that  despise. 

What  the  mighty  love  has  done ; 
Fear  examples,  and  be  wise : 

Fair  Calisto  was  a  nun  ; 
Leda,  sailing  on  the  stream 

To  deceive  the  hopes  of  man. 
Love  accounting  but  a  dream, 

Doated  on  a  silver  swan  ; 
Danae  in  a  brazen  tower, 
Where  no  love  was,  loved  a  shower. 

"  Hear,  ye  ladies  that  are  coy. 

What  the  mighty  love  can  do ; 
Fear  the  fierceness  of  the  boy : 

The  chaste  moon  he  makes  to  woo ; 
Vesta,  kindling  holy  fires, 

Circled  round  ul)out  with  spies, 


Enylish  Literature.  119 

Never  dreaming  loose  desires, 

Doting  at  the  altar  dies ; 
Ilion,  in  a  short  hour,  higher 
He  can  build  and  once  more  tire." 

You  will  notice  the  tone  of  gallantry  in  Rochester's, 
which  is  attractive  enough,  although  it  lacks  the  sort  of 
musical  dignity  of  the  other.  Indeed,  as  we  all  know,  the 
cavaljers  brought  down  the  traditions  of  the  early  song- 
writers in  a  way  that  is  sure  to  win  admiration,  but  even 
the  best  of  their  work  lacks  the  sort  of  classical  finish 
which  we  find  in  the  occasional  lyrics  of  the  drama- 
tists, such  as,  for  instance,  Peele's  "His  golden  locks  time 
hath  to  silver  turned  ;"  Green's  "Ah,  what  is  love?  It  is 
a  pretty  thing  ;"  Dekker's  "  Art  thou  poor,  yet  hast  thou 
golden  slumbers  ;"  Nash's  "  Spring,  the  sweet  spring  ;" 

and  his 

"Adieu;  farewell  earth's  bliss. 

This  world  uncertain  is: 

Fond  are  life's  lustful  jo^'S ; 

Death  proves  them  all  but  toys. 

None  from  his  darts  can  fly: 

I  am  sick,  I  must  die. 

Lord  have  mercy  on  us ! 

***** 
"  Beauty  is  but  a  flower, 

Which  wrinkles  will  devour: 

Brightness  falls  from  the  air  ; 

Queens  have  died  young  and  fair; 

Dust  hath  closed  Helen's  eye ; 

I  am  sick,  I  must  die. 

Lord  have  mercy  on  us  !" 

To  say  nothing  of  Shakspere's  songs,  Ben  Jonson's,  and 
the  best  of  Beaumont  and  Fletcher's,  as, 

"  Roses,  their  sharp  spines  being  gone, 
Not  royal  in  their  smells  alone. 
But  in  their  hue." 


I20  English  Literature. 

The  earlier  eaAalier  songs  are  good,  such  as  those  of 

Lovehice  : 

'•  Wheu  love  with  unooufiued  wings ;" 

and  the  one  "  To  Lueasta,  on  Going  to  the  Wars  :'' 

'■  Tell  me  not.  sweet,  I  am  imkiiul ;" 

or  '*  To  Althea  from  Prison  :""  hut  in  the  jdav-writers  Ave 
find  a  new  quality,  which  would  make  it  nearly  impossi- 
ble, for  instance,  to  confound  one  of  the  songs  of  the  later 
time  with  those  that  preceded  them. 

Take,  for  example,  this  one,  by  Congreve  : 

"  See,  see,  she  wakes,  Sabina  wakes  I 
And  now  the  suu  begins  to  rise ; 
Less  glorious  is  the  morn  that  breaks 

From  his  bright  beams  than  her  fair  eyes. 

"  With  light  united,  day  they  give, 

But  different  fates  'ere  night  fulfil ; 
How  many  by  his  warmth  will  live ! 
How  many  will  her  coldness  kill  I 

This  one,  by  Etherege  : 

''  It  is  not,  Celia,  in  your  power 

To  say  how  long  our  love  will  last ; 
It  may  be  we,  within  this  hour, 

May  lose  those  joys  we  now  do  taste: 
The  blessed,  who  immortal  be, 
From  change  of  love  are  only  free. 

"  Then  since  we  mortal  lovers  are, 

Ask  not  how  long  our  love  will  last ; 
But,  while  it  does,  let  us  take  care 

Each  minute  be  with  pleasure  past. 
Were  it  not  madness  to  de!iy 
To  live,  because  we're  sure  to  die  ? 

"Fear  not,  though  love  and  beauty  fail, 
My  reason  shall  my  heart  direct: 
Your  kindness  now  shall  then  prevail, 
And  passion  turn  into  respect. 


EiKjliali  Literature. 

Celia,  at  worst,  you'll  in  tlie  end 
But  change  a  lover  for  a  friend." 

Tills,  by  Hedlcy  : 

"  Not,  Celia,  that  I  jiistcr  am 
Or  better  than  the  rest ; 
For  I  would  eliange  each  hour,  like  them, 
Were  not  my  heart  at  rest. 

"  Hut  I  am  tied  to  very  thee 
]5y  every  tliought  I  have: 
Thy  face  I  only  care  to  see, 
Thy  heart  I  only  crave. 

"  All  that  in  woman  is  adored 
In  thy  dear  self  I  find — 
For  the  whole  sex  can  but  afford 
The  handsome  and  the  kind. 

"  Why,  then,  should  I  seek  further  store 
And  still  make  love  anew  ? 
When  change  itself  can  give  no  more 
'Tis  easy  to  be  true." 

And  this,  l>y  Rochester  : 

"  All  my  past  life  is  mine  no  more. 

The  flying  hours  are  gone  ; 

Like  transitory  dreams  giv'n  o'er 

Whose  images  are  kept  in  store 

By  memory  alone. 

"The  time  that  is  to  come  is  not; 

How,  then,  can  it  be  mine '? 
The  pi'esent  moment's  all  my  lot, 
And  that  as  fast  as  it  is  got, 

Phillis,  is  only  thine! 

"Then  talk  not  of  inconstancy, 
False  hearts,  and  broken  vows  ; 
If  I,  by  miracle  can  be 
This  live-long  minute  true  to  thee, 
'Tis  all  that  Heaven  allows." 
(i 


121 


122  English  Literature. 

We  notice,  in  the  first  place,  command  of  rhythms  ; 
take,  for  instance,  this  from  one  of  Dry  den's  songs  (from 
"King  Arthm-")  : 

"  0  Sight,  the  mother  of  desires, 

What  charming  objects  dost  thou  yield ! 

'Tis  sweet  wheu  tedious  night  expires, 
To  see  the  rosy  morning  gild 

Tlie  mountain-tops  and  paint  the  fields. 

But  wlien  Clarinda  comes  in  sight, 

She  makes  the  summer's  day  more  bright, 

And  when  she  goes  away,  'tis  night ;" 

or  this  from  "  Cleomenes  ;  or,  the  Sjiartan  Hero  "  (1692)  : 

"  No,  no,  poor  suffering  heart,  no  change  endeavour ; 
Choose  to  sustain  the  smart,  rather  than  have  her ; 
My  ravish'd  eyes  behold  such  charms  about  lier, 
I  can  die  with  her,  but  not  live  without  her ; 
One  tender  sigh  of  hers  to  see  me  languish. 
Will  more  than  pay  the  price  of  my  past  anguish; 
Beware,  0  cruel  fair,  how  j-ou  smile  on  me, 
'Twas  a  kind  look  of  yours  that  has  undone  me. 

"Love  has  in  store  for  me  one  happy  minute, 
And  she  will  end  my  pain  who  did  begin  it ; 
Then  no  day  void  of  bliss,  of  pleasure,  leaving, 
Ages  shall  slide  away  without  perceiving: 
Cupid  shall  guard  the  door,  the  more  to  please  us, 
And  keep  out  time  and  death,  when  they  would  seize  us ; 
Time  and  death  shall  depart,  and  say,  in  flying. 
Love  has  found  out  a  way  to  live  by  dying." 

Charming  as  these  verses  of  Dryden's  are,  they  bear  to 
our  ears  the  marks  of  the  decay  of  literature  ;  and  yet, 
while  more  vivid  proofs  might  easily  be  found  of  the  gen- 
eral inferiority,  these  lines  of  Mrs.  Behn's  on  the  death  of 
Waller,  which  outdo  the  usual  extravagance  even  of  epi- 
taphs, will  show  how  well  the  age  thought  of  itself  : 


English  Literature.  123 

"  Long  did  the  untun'd  world  in  ignorance  stray, 
Producing  nothing  that  was  great  and  gay, 
Till  taught  by  thee  the  true  poetic  way ; 
Rough  were  the  tracks  before,  dull  and  obscure, 
Nor  pleasure  nor  instruction  could  procure ; 
Their  thoughtless  labours  could  no  passion  move, 
Sure,  in  that  age,  the  poets  knew  not  love. 
Tiiat  charming  god,  like  apparitions,  then. 
Was  only  talked  on  and  ne'er  seen  by  men. 
Darkness  was  o'er  the  Muses'  land  display'd. 
And  e'en  the  chosen  tribe  unguided  strayed. 
Till  by  thee  rescued  from  the  Egyptian  night. 
They  now  look  up  and  view  the  god  of  light. 
That  taught  them  how  to  love  and  how  to  write." 

V.  The  extracts  I  have  given  will  make  it  clear  that 
the  English  stage  was  not  in  a  healthy  state  at  the  end  of 
the  seventeenth  century.  I  have  passed  over  the  most 
objectionable  side  on  account  of  the  impossibility  of  pre- 
senting it  fairly.  Mere  denunciation  of  the  faults  of  the 
English  comedy  of  the  Restoration  would  be  idle,  and 
since  in  the  history  of  literature  it  was  wholly  sterile  and 
left  behind  it  no  successor  we  may  safely  leave  it  un- 
touched. The  later  development  of  the  tragedies,  as  Ave 
have  seen  them  in  Lee  and  Otway,  served  as  a  model  for 
succeeding  playwrights  in  thenext  century  ;  but  the  com- 
edy forms  a  separate  chapter,  without  a  sequel,  and  what 
put  an  end  to  it,  as  much  as  anything,  was  a  little  volume 
of  288  pages,  by  the  Rev.  Jeremy  Collier,  entitled,  "A 
Short  View  of  the  Immorality  and  Profaneness  of  the  Eng- 
lish Stage  :  Together  with  the  Sense  of  Antiquity  upon 
this  Argument."  This  book  appeared  in  1698,  running 
through  three  editions  in  the  year  of  its  publication. 

The  faults  which  it  condemned  at  last  brought  their 
own  punishment.  When,  twenty  years  before,  Bunyan, 
in  describing  Vanity  Fair,  said, "  at  this  Fair  is  at  all  times 


124  English  Literature. 

to  be  seen  Jugglings,  Cheats,  Games,  Plays,  Fools,  Apes, 
Knaves,  and  Rogues,  and  that  of  every  kind,"  it  was  ap- 
parent that  he  expressed  the  opinion  of  the  Puritans  con- 
cerning the  stage  ;  and  for  their  opinion  no  one  cared  at 
all.  No  Puritan  would  have  been  listened  to  by  the  general 
public  of  those  who  professed  an  interest  in  letters.  This 
denunciation  of  plays  would  have  meant  in  those  times 
political  prejudice  and  religious  bigotry.  Collier,  how- 
ever, had  this  great  advantage,  that  he  was  an  ardent  Tory, 
Avho  was  out  of  favor  at  court  for  his  refusal  to  take  the 
oath  of  allegiance  to  William  after  the  Revolution  of  1688, 
and  had  already  been  imprisoned  in  Newgate  for  his  po- 
litical writings.  More  than  this,  besides  sturdily  main- 
taining the  rights  of  James  II.,  he  had  given  religious 
consolation  to  Sir  John  Friend  and  Sir  William  Parkyns 
when  they  were  condemned  to  death  for  plotting  against 
William  ;  and  for  giving  these  men  absolution  at  the  foot 
of  the  scaffold  he  had  been  blamed  by  the  bishops,  sum- 
moned before  the  court  of  the  King's  Bench,  and  for  his 
contumacy  in  not  recognizing  the  authority  of  this  court 
he  had  been  outlawed.  This  was  the  time  he  chose  for 
stiiTing  up  another  hornet's  nest,  by  denouncing  the  most 
popular  authors.  He  was,  at  any  rate,  sure  not  to  be  called 
a  Puritan. 

With  regard  to  the  immorality  of  the  stage  he  had 
abundance  of  testimony,  but  he  puts  on  the  witness-stand 
only  the  works  of  Dryden,  Wycherley,  Congreve,  D'Urf ey, 
and  Vanbrugh,  and  generally  their  latest  writings,  and 
from  these  examples  proves  his  statements.  He  attacked 
their  profanity  with  equal  ardor  and  less  judgment.  For 
instance,  in  support  of  his  charge  that  the  writers,  in  their 
abuse  of  religion  and  Holy  Scripture,  "don't  stop  short 
of  blasphemy,"  he  says  that  "in  the  close  of  the  play 
['  Mock  Astrologer ']  they  make  sport  with  Apparitions  and 


Engluh  Literature.  125 

Fiends.  One  of  the  devils  sneezes,  upon  this  they  give 
him  the  blessing  of  the  occasion,  and  conclude  lie  has  got 
cold  by  being  too  long  out  of  the  fire.'''' 

What  Collier  calls  "the  most  extraordinary  passage  is 
this  : 

"  •  Carlos.  For  yonr  comfort,  marriage,  they  say,  is  holy. 
"  '  Sancho.  Ai/,  and  so  is  martyrdom,  as  they  say,  but  both  of /hem  are  good 
for  just  nothing  but  to  make  an  end  of  a  man^s  life.'' 

"  I  shall  make  no  reflections  upon  this.  There  needs  no 
reading  upon  a  monster.  'Tis  shown  enough  by  its  own 
deformity." 

Congreve,  or,  at  least,  one  of  his  characters,  spoke 
of  Solomon  as  "wise  by  his  judgment  in  astrology," 
"  Thus,"  says  Collier,  "  the  wisest  prince  is  dwindled  into 

a  gypsy !" 

Sir  Sampson  Sampson  is  reminded  of  the  strongest  Sam- 
son of  the  name,  "  who  pulled  an  old  house  over  his  head 
at  last."  "  Here  you  have  sacred  history  burlesqued,  and 
Sampson  once  more  brought  into  the  house  of  Dagon  to 
make  sport  for  the  Philistines  !" 

Every  charge  that  he  brings  is  supported  by  reference 
to  all  the  plays  of  Greece  and  Rome,  and  while  he  shows 
blasphemy,  as  we  have  just  seen,  in  English  plays,  it  is 
part  of  his  business  to  prove  the  absence  of  this  in  the 
plays  of  the  ancients.  But  "  there  is  one  ill  sentence  in 
Sophocles.  Philoctetes  calls  the  gods  kuimi,  and  libels  their 
administration.  This  ofiicer,  we  must  understand,  was  left 
upon  a  solitary  island,  ill-used  by  his  friends,  and  harassed 
with  poverty  and  ulcers,  for  ten  years  together.  These, 
under  the  ignorance  of  paganism,  were  trying  circum- 
stances, and  take  oflE  somewhat  of  the  malignity  of  the 
complaint." 

He  undertakes  to  prove  that  priests  were  ridiculed  by 
the  comic  writers,  and  he  even  goes  so  far  as  to  abuse  Dry- 


126  English  Literature. 

den  because  in  "  Cleomenes  "  one  of  the  characters  speaks 
disrespectfully  of  the  Egyptian  god  Apis  : 

"  Accurs'd  be  thou,  grass-eating,  foddered  god  ! 
Accurs'd  thy  temple  !    More  accurs'd  thy  priests  !" 

He  devotes  thirteen  pages  to  illustrating  the  manner  in 
which  English  priests  are  turned  to  ridicule,  and  twenty- 
eight  to  show  how  j)riests  were  treated  by  Homer,  Vergil, 
the  Greek  tragedians,  Aristophanes,  Plautus,  Terence, 
Corneille,  Moliere  (who  "bring  no  priests  of  any  kind 
upon  the  stage"),  Racine,  Shakspere,  Ben  Jonson,  Beau- 
mont and  Fletcher;  and  then  he  goes  on  to  prove,  upon  their 
accounts,  "what  right  the  clergy  have  to  regard  and  fair 
usage."  That  they  have  received  this  elsewhere  he  makes 
clear  by  illustrations  from  the  conduct  of  the  Jews,  the 
Egyptians,  the  Persian  Magi,  the  Druids  of  Gaul,  the 
priesthood  of  Rome,  of  France,  of  Hungary,  Muscovy, 
Spain,  Italy,  etc.;  and  with  every  new  point  he  lugs  in 
the  ancients  and  the  rest  of  Europe.* 

All  of  this  seems  sufficiently  Avide  of  the  mark,  and  to 
tend  simply  to  confuse  what  Avas  very  clear — namely,  the 
corruption  of  the  stage  ;  yet,  although  Collier  lacked  all 
sympathy  with  artistic  principles,  and  overshot  his  mark 
by  ptitting  all  the  blame  for  fashionable  viciousness  upon 
the  stage,  there  are  vigor,  manliness,  and  intelligence  in 
the  book.  To  be  sure,  he  blames  Congreve  for  calling  a 
coachman   Jehu,  and  a   parson  Mr.  Prig,  and    criticises 

*  The  vahie  of  classical  precedent  at  this  time  is  most  striking,  though, 
perhaps,  it  is  nowhere  more  vividly  illustrated  than  here.  With  every 
new  point  the  Greek  and  Roman  writers  are  invoked  to  strengthen  his 
arguments  or  to  refute  those  of  his  enemies.  No  sooner  have  they  passed 
off  the  stage  in  one  paragraph  than  they  are  called  back  to  dispose  of 
something  else.  One  is  reminded  of  those  clocks  in  which,  every  time  the 
hour  strikes,  the  apostles  march  out  of  one  door,  stalk  across  the  stage, 
and  then  go  in  again. 


English  Literature.  127 

Vanbrngh  for  neglecting  the  three  unities  ;  but  his  gen- 
eral point  is  clear  beneath  even  his  accumulation  of  foreign 
testimony. 

Naturally,  the  book  excited  great  wrath.  Almost  all 
of  those  attacked  directly,  or  by  implication,  made  retort, 
but  Congreve,  who  was  distinctly  a  man  of  wit,  showed 
none  of  it  in  his  answer  ;  Vanbrugh  did  no  better,  and 
Collier,  who  certainly  had  the  right  on  his  side,  had  dis- 
tinctly the  best  of  the  protracted  arguments.*  Dryden, 
almost  if  not  quite  alone,  forbore  to  make  reply,  but  in 
the  preface  to  his  "  Fables  "  (1700)  he  said:  "I  shall  say  the 
less  of  Mr.  Collier,  because  in  many  things  he  has  taxed  me 
justly  ;  and  I  have  pleaded  guilty  to  all  thoughts  and  ex- 
pressions of  mine  which  can  be  truly  argued  of  obscenity, 
profaneness,  or  immorality.  If  he  be  my  enemy,  let  him 
triumph  ;  if  he  be  my  friend,  as  I  have  given  him  no  per- 

*  John  Dennis  said :  "  Now  there  is  no  Nation  in  Europe,  as  has  been 
observed  above  a  thousand  times,  that  is  so  generally  addicted  to  the 
Spleen,  as  the  English,  and  what  is  apparent  to  any  observer,  from  the 
reigning  distemper  of  the  Clime,  which  is  inseparable  from  the  Spleen  ; 
from  that  gloomy  and  sullen  temper,  which  is  generally  spread  through 
the  nation,  from  that  natural  discontentedness  which  makes  us  so  uneasie 
to  one  another,  because  we  are  so  uneasie  to  ourselves  :  and  lastly,  from  our 
jealousies  and  suspicions,  which  makes  us  so  uneasie  to  ourselves  and  to 
one  another,  and  have  so  often  made  us  dangerous  to  the  Government, 
and  by  consequence  to  ourselves.  Now  the  English  being  more  splenetick 
than  other  people,  and  consequently  more  thoughtful  and  more  reflecting, 
and  therefore  more  scrupulous  in  allowing  their  passions,  and  consequently 
things  seldom  hapning  in  life  to  move  their  passions  so  agreeably  to  their 
reasons,  as  to  entertain  and  please  them ;  and  there  being  no  true  and  sin- 
cere pleasure  unless  these  passions  are  thus  moved,  nor  any  happiness 
without  pleasure,  it  follows,  that  the  English  to  be  happy,  have  more  need 
than  other  people  of  something  that  will  raise  their  passions  in  such  a 
manner,  as  shall  be  agreeable  to  their  reasons,  that  by  consequence  they 
have  more  need  of  the  drama." — Usefulness  of  the  Stage  (1698),  p.  12. 
These  are  not  the  words  of  a  formidable  antagonist. 


128  Eiujlltih  Liu  rat  art, 

sonal  occasion  to  be  otherwise,  he  will  be  glad  of  my  re- 
pentance. .  .  .  Yet  it  were  not  difficult  to  prove  that  in 
many  places  he  has  perverted  my  meaning  by  his  glosses  ; 
and  interpreted  my  words  into  blasphemy  and  bawdry  of 
which  they  were  not  guilty  ;  besides  that  he  is  too  much 
given  to  horse-play  in  his  raillery  ;  and  comes  to  battle 
like  a  dictator  from  the  plough.  I  wnll  not  say  'The 
zeal  of  God's  house  has  eaten  him  up  ;'  but  I  am  sure  it 
has  devoured  some  part  of  his  good  manners  and  civility." 
And  he  adds  :  "  He  has  lost  ground  at  the  latter  end  of 
the  day,  by  i^ursuing  his  point  too  far  :  .  .  .  from  immoral 
plays  to  no  plays."  * 

*  In  1*719,  a  certain  Bedford,  chaplain  to  the  Dulve  of  Bedford,  repub- 
lished a  book  that  first  appeared  in  1706,  called  "A  Serious  Remon- 
strance in  behalf  of  the  Christian  religion  against  the  horrid  blasphemies 
and  impieties  which  are  still  used  in  the  English  playhouse."  Here  is  a 
sample  of  his  arguments :  "  When  God  was  pleased  to  vindicate  His  own 
honour,  and  show  that  he  would  not  be  thus  affronted,  by  sending  a  most 
dreadful  storm  .  .  .  yet,  so  great  was  the  obstinacy  of  the  stage  under 
such  signal  judgments,  that  we  are  told  the  actors  did  in  a  few  days  after 
entertain  again  their  audience  with  the  ridiculous  i)lays  of  the  '  Tempest ' 
and  '  Macbeth,'  and  that  at  the  mention  of  the  chimneys  being  blown 
dawn  the  audience  were  pleased  to  clap  at  an  unusual  length  ...  as  if 
they  would  outbrave  the  judgment,  throw  Providence  out  of  the  chair, 
place  the  devil  in  his  stead,  and  provoke  God  once  more  to  plead  his  own 
cause  by  sending  another  calamity." 

He  accused  playwriters  of  restoring  Pagan  worship  by  their  reference 
to  Cupid,  Jupiter,  Diana,  etc.,  of  encouraging  witchcraft  or  magic;  "for," 
he  says,  "  by  bewitching,  magick,  and  enchanting,  they  only  signify  some- 
thing which  is  most  pleasant  and  desirable."  He  even  detected  blasphemy 
in  Addison's  "  Cato,"  in  lines  like  these  : 

"This,  this  is  life  indeed  !  life  worth  preserving! 
Such  life  as  Juba  never  felt  till  now  !" 
and 

"  My  joy  !     My  best  beloved  !     My  only  wish  !" 

Thirty  years  later,  William  Law,  in  his  treatise,  "  On  the  Absolute  tin- 


English  Literature.  izg 

That  was  scarcely  an  exaggeration  of  the  result  of  the 
book.  Societies  for  the  encouragement  of  good  morals 
took  courage  ;  King  William  renewed  the  orders  he  had 
already  given  to  prevent  the  licensing  "any  plays  con- 
taining exf)ressions  contrary  to  religion  and  good  man- 
ners ;"  Queen  Anne,  at  the  beginning  of  her  reign,  helped 
the  same  cause.  The  erring  comic  writers  purged  their 
published  works  of  some  of  their  offensiveness  ;  and  their 
later  writings  showed  a  new  regard  for  decorum.  Indeed, 
the  popular  feeling  was  so  high  that  they  had  to  shorten 
sail.  The  old  Puritan  spirit  was  revived,  and  the  closing  of 
the  playhouses  was  urged  in  various  quarters,  which  would 
have  been  but  again  to  let  one  excess  take  the  place  of  an- 
other. This  bigotry  would  but  have  insjjired  another  out- 
break of  indecency.  Fortunately  there  were  men  living 
who  were  able  to  take  sounder  views,  and  to  make  a  sort 
of  compromise  between  the  wits,  as  they  called  themselves, 
and  the  public.  Sir  Richard  Blackmore,  an  absolutely 
uninspired  poet,  the  Tupper  of  his  age,  had  even  preceded 
Collier  in  his  attack  on  the  corruption  of  the  age,  and  had 
written  voluminous  epic  poems  for  this  excellent  reason, 
"  that  the  young  gentlemen  and  ladies  who  are  delighted 
with  poetry  might  have  a  useful,  at  least  a  harmless,  en- 
tertainment," such  as  they  could  not  get  from  other  poets  ; 
but  the  remedy  he  prescribed  no  one  could  swallow — his 
books  were  practically  unread.  Addison  was  the  man  who 
reconciled  literature  and  life.  Let  us  see  how  he  did  this, 
and,  first,  how  he  was  prepared  for  this  arduous  task. 

lawfulness  of  the  Stage,"  said  that,  in  going  to  the  theatre,  "  You  are  as  cer- 
tainly going  to  the  devil's  triumph  as  if  you  were  going  to  those  old  sports 
where  people  committed  murder  and  offered  Christians  to  be  devoured  by 
wild  beasts."  And  at  the  Shakspere  Jubilee  (IVGO),  the  heavy  rains  wero 
attributed  to  the  vengeance  of  heaven :  vide  Lecky,  "  England  in  the 
Eighteenth  Century,"  i.  594,  595. 

6* 


130  English  Literature. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

I.  Addiso?^  was  born  in  1672  ;  his  father  was  a  clergy- 
man, and,  in  1683,  Dean  of  Lichfield.  At  school  he  be- 
came intimate  with  Steele.  The  friendship  then  formed 
was  of  great  service  to  English  literature,  by  enlisting,  as 
we  shall  see,  in  a  common  cause  two  able  writers  who  sup- 
plemented each  other  admirably.  Since  then,  however, 
their  friendship  has  been  a  subject  of  dissension.  This  has 
happened  because  praise  of  one  is  supposed  to  imply  blame 
of  the  other,  and  one  who  speaks  approvingly  of  Steele's 
enthusiasm  is  imagined  to  be  secretly  condemning  Addi- 
son's coolness.*     Yet,  since  not  all  writers  are  admirable, 

*  Those  who  wish  to  settle  the  matter  more  fully  will  fiud  a  full  dis- 
cussion in  Macaulay's  essay  on  Addison,  and  John  Forster's  on  Steele,  in 
vol.  ii.  of  his  "  Historical  and  Biographical  Essays."  Mr.  Forster  thought 
that  Macaulay  had  set  up  Addison  unduly,  at  Steele's  expense,  and  he 
makes  a  warm  defence  of  his  favorite.  AVith  these  two  sources  of  in- 
formation before  him,  the  reader  has  a  good  chance  of  making  up  his 
mind  fairly.  Still,  we  should  remember  how  hard  it  is  fully  to  understand 
people  as  remote  from  us  as,  say,  our  next-door  neighbors,  and  not  be 
over-quick  in  deciding  about  people  who  lived  nearly  two  hundred  years 
ago.  We  always  like  to  paint  them  in  strong  colors,  to  describe  them 
with  a  single  word.  If,  for  instance,  we  read  that  so-and-so  was  avari- 
cious, we  picture  him  to  ourselves  sitting  in  a  dark  room,  behind  a  barred 
door,  counting  his  money-bags;  whereas  his  avarice  may  have  been  a 
trait  that  showed  itself  only  indirectly,  by  a  certain  hardness  towards  his 
friends.  The  surest  way  of  ascertaining  at  a  later  day  what  a  man  was, 
is  to  find  out  the  impression  he  made  upon  his  friends,  and  double  weight 


English  Literature.  131 

let  us  be  grateful  foi-  both.  I  do  not  know  whether  it  was 
ever  the  fashion  to  make  invidious  comparisons  between 
Beaumont  and  Fletcher,  but  if  they  escaped  that  fate  they 
were  rare  exceptions.  Goethe  and  Schiller,  Wordsworth 
and  Coleridge,  whose  names  are  commonly  coupled,  were 
not  so  fortunate. 

In  due  time  Addison  became  a  student  at  Oxford,  whei-e 
Steele  again  met  him.  His  first  poetical  essay  was  a  short 
address  to  Dryden,  for  whom  he  composed  the  ax-guments 
l)refixed  to  the  several  books  of  his  translation  of  the 
"^Eneid,"  and  translated  the  greater  part  of  the  fourth 
"  Georgic,"  which  was  published  in  the  same  volume  ^dth 
"  An  Account  of  the  Greatest  English  Poets,"  and  a  transla- 
tion from  Ovid,     The  account  of  the  poets,  or,  as  he  called 

it, 

"  A  short  account  of  all  the  Muse-possesst, 

That  down  from  Chaucer's  days  to  Dryden's  thues, 

Have  spent  then-  noble  rage  in  Brhish  rhymes," 

is  a  valueless  production,  from  which  I  make  a  few  ex- 
tracts to  show  once  more  the  manner  of  thought  current 
at  the  time  : 

"  Chaucer  first,  a  merry  bard,  arose, 
And  many  a  story  told  in  rhyme  and  prose ; 
But  age  has  rusted  what  the  poet  writ, 
Worn  out  his  language  and  obscured  his  wit ; 
In  vain  he  jests  in  his  unpolished  strain, 
And  tries  to  make  his  readers  laugh  in  vain. 

"  Old  Spenser  next,  warm'd  with  poetic  rage, 
In  ancient  tales  amus'd  a  barbarous  age ; 


must  be  given  to  praise  from  his  enemies.  Applying  this  test,  we  find 
Addison  a  most  lovable  man.  He  was  shy,  and  would  never  talk  to 
more  than  one  person  at  a  time,  but  his  conversation  must  have  been  de- 
lightful. For  this  we  have  the  testimony  of  Pope  and  Swift,  and  many 
others.  Steele  said  it  was  Terence  and  Catullus  rolled  into  one,  with 
something  else  that  was  neither  of  them,  but  Addison  alone. 


132  English  Literature. 

An  age  that,  yet  uncultivate  and  rude, 
Where'er  the  poet's  fancy  led,  pursued 
Through  pathless  fields  and  unfrequented  floods 
To  dens  of  dragons  and  enchanted  woods. 
But  now  the  mystic  tale  that  pleased  of  yore 
Can  charm  an  understanding  age  no  more." 

Sliakspere  is  omitted  ;  the  next  j^oet  is 

"  Great  Cowley  then  (a  mighty  genius)  wrote. 

He  more  had  pleased  us,  liad  he  jileased  us  less. 

***** 
Thy  only  fault  is  wit  in  its  excess. 

***** 
Bless'd  man !  who  now  shall  be  for  ever  known 
In  Sprat's  successful  labours  and  thy  own." 

Sprat,  if  we  may  interrupt  Addison  for  a  moment,  not 
only  edited  Cowley  and  wrote  his  life  ;  he  also  imitated 
him.  How  he  did  this  may  be  gathered  from  the  follow- 
ing poem,  which  is  avowedly  in  Cowley's  manner,  "On 
his  Mistress  Drown'd  :" 

"  Sweet  stream,  that  dost  with  equal  pace 
Both  thyself  fly,  and  thyself  chase, 
Forbear  awhile  to  flow, 
And  listen  to  my  woe. 

"  Then  go,  and  tell  the  sea  that  all  its  brine 

Is  fresh,  compared  to  mine  : 
Inform  it  that  the  gentler  dame. 
Who  was  the  life  of  all  my  flame, 

I'  th'  glory  of  her  bud. 

Has  passed  the  fatal  flood. 
Death  by  this  stroke  triumphs  above 

The  greatest  power  of  love : 

Alas,  alas,  I  must  give  o'er. 
My  sighs  will  let  me  say  no  more. 
Go  on,  sweet  stream,  and  henceforth  rest 
Ko  more  than  does  my  troubled  breast ; 


EiKjlwh  Literature.  133 

Aud  if  my  sad  complaints  have  made  thee  stay, 
These  tears,  these  tears,  shall  mend  thy  way."  * 

From  Sprat,  Addison  turned  to  Milton  : 

"  Whate'er  his  pen  describes,  I  more  than  see 
Whilst  every  verse,  arrayed  in  majesty, 
Bold  and  sublime,  my  whole  attention  draws, 
And  seems  above  the  critic's  nicer  laws." 

Towards  the  end,  he  relapses  into  the  customary  civility 
of  the  day,  and  praises  "  the  courtly  Waller,"  "  harmoni- 
ous bard,"  Roscommon,  Denham,  "  artful  Dryden,"  "  har- 
monious Congreve,"  and  "  noble  Montague."  It  would  be 
the  height  of  unfairness  to  estimate  Addison's  critical 
ability  by  this  little  poem  ;  it  was  but  an  exercise  in  ex- 
pression wherein  he  echoed  the  language  of  the  time.  He 
had  not  yet  formed  his  own  opinions.f     While  he  was  in 

*  Lee,  in  his  "  Sophonisba,"  has  these  lines  : 

"  Near  to  some  murmuring  brook  I'll  lay  me  down, 
Whose  waters  if  they  should  too  shallow  flow 
My  tears  shall  swell  them  up  till  I  will  drown." 

An  early  instance  of  these  floods  of  tears  is  to  be  found  in  Montemayor's 
"Diana  Enamorada,"  1542  ;  Venice,  1568,  p.  71 ;  Engl,  trans.,  by  Bartholo- 
mew Yong,  London,  1598,  p.  78:  "  What  is  it  (thinke  you)  that  makes  the 
greene  grasse  of  this  iland  growe,  and  the  waters  (that  encompasse  it 
roundabout)  to  encrease,  but  my  ceaseless  teares  ?"  The  question  is  asked 
by  the  deserted  Belisa,  who  bemoans  her  faithless  lover. 

f  It  would  be  a  great  mistake  to  confound  these  verses,  which  are 
scarcely  more  than  an  exercise  in  penmanship,  with  Addison's  real  work. 
Yet  it  is  a  mistake  that  is  constantly  made  with  regard  to  writers,  each 
one  of  whom  is  apparently  considered  a  complete  unit  from  the  time  he 
began  to  write  until  his  death.  In  fact,  however,  the  first  compositions  of 
an  author  are  generally  valuable  for  showing  what  were  the  strongest 
tastes  of  his  parents  and  teachers.  Thus,  Dryden,  who  was  one  of  the 
clearest  of  writers,  began  -with  a  copious  accumulation  of  conceits  ;  Pope, 
whose  strength  lay  in  wit  and  social  satire,  began  with  languid  and  arti- 
ficial pastorals ;    Wordsworth,  with  an  echo  of  Goldsmith,  conventional 


134  English  Literature. 

process  of  forming  tliem  lie  was  exposed  to  other  inilu- 
ences  ;  and  what  some  of  these  Avere  we  may  gather  from 
this  title  of  a  book  published  in  1687  :  "  Spenser  Redivivus; 
containing  the  first  book  of  the  Faery  Queen,  His  Essential 
Design  preserv'd,  but  his  Obsolete  Language  and  Manner 
of  Verse  totally  laid  aside.  Deliver'd  in  Heroick  Numbers, 
by  a  Person  of  Quality."  *  At  the  same  time  flourished 
Thomas  Rymer,  whom  Pope,  according  to  Spence,  called 
about  the  best  critic  we  have  ever  had,  and  whom  Ma- 
caulay  calls  the  worst  that  ever  lived.  He  wrote  on 
Shakspere  first,  in  "  The  Tragedies  of  the  Last  Age  ;  Con- 
sidered and  Examined  by  the  Practice  of  the  Ancients 
and  the  Common  Sense  of  all  Ages,  1678-92  ;"  and  sec- 
ondly, in  "A  Short  View  of  the  Tragedy  of  the  Last 
Age  ;  its  Original  Excellency  and  Corruption  ;  with  some 
Reflections  on  Shakspear,  and  other  Practitioners  for  the 
Stage,  1693."  Judging  tilings  by  the  practice  of  the 
Ancients  was,  as  we  have  seen,  the  fashion  of  that  day. 
Addison,  in  his  poem,  says  that  henceforth  the  Simois  and 

"  rapid  Xanthus'  celebrated  flood  " 
shall  no 

"  longer  be  the  poet's  highest  themes, 
Though  gods  and  heroes  fought  promiscuous  in  their  streams ;" 

but  that,  instead,  they  will  sing  of  the  battle  of  the  Boyne. 
And  the  common-sense  of  all  ages  means  generally  the 

heroics,  and  personification  ;  Victor  Hugo,  witli  praise  of  church  and  state. 
Every  young  man  is  brought  up  on  the  conservative  teachings  of  his  elders, 
and  it  is  some  time  before  he  can  overtake  the  best  thought  of  his  day, 
wliich  is  just  in  advance  not  only  of  beginners  but  of  most  teachers.  Tlie 
youth  hears  vaguely,  if  at  all,  of  those  who  are  introducing  the  novelties 
which  are  to  be  the  commonplaces  of  the  next  generation  ;  he  may  sigh  for 
them,  but  he  hears  them  spoken  of  with  dislike.  Every  father  tries  to  turn 
the  taste  of  his  children  to  what  he  liked  when  young,  and  generally  the 
revolt  begins  only  when  the  young  man  has  stepped  out  into  the  world. 
*  Vide  Morley's  "First  Sketch  of  English  Literature,"  p.  756. 


English  Literature.  135 

prejudices  of  him  who  appeals  to  it.  It  certainly  meant 
so  in  this  case,  for  Rymer  was  most  severe  in  what  he 
said  about  Shakspere.  It  was  "  Othello  "  that  he  picked 
to  pieces.  "  Why  was  not  this  called  the  tragedy  of  the 
handkerchief  ?  We  have  heard  of  Fortunatus,  his  purse, 
and  of  the  invisible  cloak  long  ago  worn  threadbare,  and 
stowed  up  in  the  wardrobe  of  obsolete  romances  ;  one 
might  think  that  were  a  fitter  place  for  this  handkerchief 
than  that  it,  at  this  time  of  day,  be  worn  on  the  stage,  to 
raise  everywhere  this  clutter  and  turmoil."  And,  also, 
"  the  handkerchief  is  so  remote  a  trifle,  no  booby  on  this 
side  Mauritania  could  make  any  consequence  from  it." 
"  There  is  nothing,"  he  says,  "  in  the  noble  Desdemona, 
that  is  not  below  any  country  kitchen-maid  with  us."  .  .  . 
"  No  woman  bred  out  of  a  pig-sty  could  talk  so  meanly." 
Her  death,  nevertheless,  distresses  him.  "A  noble 
Venetian  lady  is  to  be  murdered  by  our  poet,  in  sober 
sadness,  purely  for  being  a  fool.  No  pagan  poet  but  would 
have  found  some  machine  for  her  deliverance.  Pegasus 
would  have  strained  hard  to  have  brought  old  Perseus  on 
his  back  ;  time  enough  to  rescue  this  Andromeda  from  so 
foul  a  monster.  Has  our  Christian  poetry  no  generosity, 
no  bowels  ?  Ha,  ha,  Sir  Launcelot !  Ha,  Sir  George  !  Will 
no  ghost  leave  the  shades  for  us  in  extremity  to  save  a 
distressed  damsel  ?"  And,  finally,  he  says:  "  In  the  neigh- 
ing of  a  horse,  or  in  the  growling  of  a  mastiff,  there  is  a 
meaning,  there  is  as  lively  expression,  and,  may  I  say,  more 
humanity,  than  many  times  in  the  tragical  flights  of  Shake- 
speare."*    With  criticism  of  this  sort  for  light  reading, 

*  Some  bold  statements  of  Rymer's  illustrative  of  the  views  then  held 
concerning  the  province  of  tragedy  are  worth  quoting :  "  We  are  to  pre- 
sume the  greatest  virtues  where  we  find  the  highest  rewards,  and  though 
it  is  not  necessary  that  all  heroes  should  be  kings,  yet,  undoubtedly,  all 
crowned  heads,  by  poetical  right,  are  heroes.     This  character  is  a  flower. 


136  Euijlisli  Literature. 

there  was  evidently  room  for  a  man  who  should  introduce 
some  of  the  charm  of  civilization.  Addison  was  busily 
fitting  himself  for  the  task.  His  acquaintance  with  Dry- 
den  brought  him  into  contact  with  Congreve,  who  in  his 
turn  introduced  him  to  Montague,  then  chancellor  of  the 
exchequer,  and  to  Lord  Somers,  solicitor  -  general,  who 
induced  Addison  to  give  uj)  his  plan  of  entering  the 
church,  and  instead  to  prepare  himself  for  political  life. 
There  is  to  be  noticed  a  great  change  from  the  time  when 
Dry  den  and  his  contemporaries  were  struggling  for  a  liv- 
ing.  Then  writers  could  barely  live  by  flattering  the  great; 
now  the  times  had  changed,  and  writers  were  sought  by 
all  of  those  in  authority.  The  reason  of  this  change  is 
simple.  Before  the  revolution  of  1688,  the  king  held  his 
place  by  right  of  birth  ;  his  authority  was  not  to  be  dis- 
puted. But  with  1688,  and  the  accession  of  William  and 
Mary,  the  royal  power  depended  on  the  will  of  the  nation; 
parliamentary  government  established  itself.  The  king 
selected  for  ministers  men  with  influence  ;  the  ministers 
had  to  seciire  influence  as  best  they  might.  Dryden's 
satirical  jjoems  had  shown  how  great  power  a  writer  pos- 
sessed, and   with  the  development^  of  the  newspaper  he 

a  prerogative,  so  certain,  so  indispensably  annexed  to  tlic  crown,  as  by  no 
poet,  or  parliament  of  poets,  ever  to  be  invaded." 

"  If  I  mistake  not,  in  poetry,  no  woman  is  to  kill  a  man,  except  his 
quality  gives  her  the  advantage  above  him ;  nor  is  a  servant  to  kill  the 
master,  nor  a  private  man,  much  less  a  subject  to  kill  a  king,  nor  on  the 
contrary.  Poetical  decency  will  not  permit  death  to  be  dealt  to  each 
other,  by  persons  whom  the  laws  of  duell  allow  not  to  enter  the  lists  to- 
getlier."  He  made  an  exception,  however,  in  favor  of  killing  a  pagan  or 
a  foreign  prince. 

Lord  Shaftesbury,  in  his  "Advice  to  an  Author,"  1710,  speaks  of  the 
"Gothic  Muse  of  Shakspeare,  Fletcher,  and  Milton  as  lisping  with  stam- 
mering tongues,  that  nothing  but  the  youth  and  rawness  of  the  age  could 
excuse," 


KiKjlmJi  L,dti'ature.  137 

became  a  more  important  person.  Then,  too,  Montague, 
Earl  of  Halifax,  who,  with  Prior,  had  written  "  The  Coun- 
try and  the  City  Mouse,"  was  a  patron  of  letters.  Somers 
had  been  prominent  in  encouraging  the  new  edition  of 
Milton  ;  Dorset,  too,  the  lord-chamberlain,  had  tried  his 
hand  at  writing.  Still,  mere  interest  in  literature  would 
have  done  but  little  had  not  Dry  den's  "  Absalom  and 
Achitophel,"  and  the  controversies  it  aroused,  shown  how 
much  power  wit  exercised.  While  Dorset  and  Mon- 
tague were  Whig  patrons  of  letters,  on  the  other  side 
Harley  and  Bolingbroke  encouraged  writers  to  draw  their 
morals  in  favor  of  Toryism.  Thus,  after  the  battle  of 
Blenheim,  1704,  Addison  wrote  his  j)anegyric.  You  will 
remember  that,  in  his  lectures  on  the  English  Humorists, 
Thackeray  mentions  the  angel's  visit  when  Addison  was 
asked  to  write  about  the  victory:  "Your  wings  seldom 
quiver  at  second  -  floor  windows  now."  Marlborough, 
Addison  said, 

"  In  peaceful  thought  the  field  of  death  surveyed, 
To  fainting  squadrons  sent  the  timely  aid, 
Inspired  repulsed  battalions  to  engage, 
And  taught  the  doubtful  battle  when  to  rage. 
So  when  an  angel  by  divine  command. 
With  rising  tempests  shakes  a  guilty  land 
(Such  as  of  late  o'er  pale  Britannia  passed), 
Calm  and  serene  he  drives  the  furious  blast ; 
And,  pleased  the  Almighty's  orders  to  perform. 
Rides  in  the  whirlwind  and  directs  the  storm." 

For  this  Addison  was  made  commissioner  of  appeals,  vice 
Mr.  Locke  ;  the  next  year  Addison  went  to  Hanover  with 
Lord  Halifax,  and  the  year  after  was  made  under-secre- 
tary  of  state. 

All  these  things  came  at  a  good  time  for  Addison.    No 
one  ever  grumbles  at  such  luck,  to  be  sure,  but  Addison, 


138  English  Litey^ature. 

who  in  1699  had  been  granted  a  pension  of  £300  in  order 
that  he  might  travel  in  preparation  for  diplomatic  life,  had 
lost  it  in  1702,  when  his  friends  went  out  of  office.  The 
battle  of  Blenheim,  as  we  say,  brought  him  into  fame, 
however.  It  was  John  Philips  who  sounded  the  praises 
of  Blenheim  from  the  Tory  side,  or,  as  Dr.  Johnson  puts 
it,  "with  occult  opposition  to  Addison."*  Here  is  an  ex- 
ample of  his  manner : 

"  Now  from  each  van 
The  brazen  instruments  of  death  discharge 
Horrible  flames,  and  turbid  streaming  clouds 
Of  smoke  sulphureous  ;  intermix'd  with  these 
Large  globous  irons  fly,  of  dreadful  hiss, 
Singeing  the  air,  and  from  long  distance  bring 
Surprising  slaughter  .  .  .  by  sudden  burst 
Disploding  murderous  bowels,  fragments  of  steel, 
And  stones  and  glass,  and  nitrous  grain  adust : 
A  thousand  ways  at  once  the  shiver'd  orbs 
Fly  diverse,  working  torment  and  foul  rout." 

As  a  not  unnatural  consequence, 

"  Unmanly  dread  invades 
The  French  astonied ;  straight  their  useless  arms 
They  quit,  and  in  ignoble  flight  confide. 
Unseemly  yelling ;  distant  hills  return 
The  hideous  noise." 

It  is  not  necessary  to  read  more.  You  wnll  notice  that 
the  lines  are  written  in  blank  verse  of  the  Miltonic  pattern. 
And  Philips,  I  may  say  by  the  Avay,  was  one  of  the  first 
of  the  English  poets  to  abandon  the  couplet  and  to  take 
to  the  rival  measure.  In  it  he  wrote  the  "  Splendid  Shil- 
ling," a  burlesque,  and  a  fifth  Georgic,  on  "  Cider,"  which 

*  Addison  had  tried  his  hand  at  the  imitation  of  Milton,  but  without 
much  success.  Vide  a  piece  out  of  M\\.  iii.  (Bohn's  edition  of  Addison's 
Works,  i.  38). 


Enylish  Literature.  139 

has  been  said  to  be  a  sound  manual  of  instruction  for  the 
farmer.  It  may  be  doubted,  however,  whether  the  farmer 
would  gather  from  these  few  lines  that  he  was  told  to 
pick  off  superfluous  fruit  : 

"  The  wise 

Spare  not  the  little  offsprings  if  they  grow 

Redundant,  but  the  thronging  clusters  thin 

By  kind  avulsion,  else  the  starveling  brood, 

Void  of  sufficient  sustenance,  will  yield 

A  slender  autumn,  which  the  niggard  soul 

Too  late  shall  weep,  and  curse  his  thrifty  hand. 

That  would  not  timely  ease  the  ponderous  boughs." 

The  general  reader  will  find  his  profit,  too,  in  studying 
the  poem  : 

"Nor  from  the  sable  ground  expect  success, 
Nor  from  cretaceous,  stubborn,  and  jejune ; 
The  must  of  pallid  hue  declares  the  soil 
Devoid  of  spirit :  wretched  he  that  quaffs 
Such  wheyish  liquors !  oft  with  colic  pangs. 
With  pungent  colic  pangs,  distrest  he'll  roar, 
And  toss,  and  turn,  and  curse  th'  unwholesome  draught."  * 

We  shall  see  plenty  of  examples  of  this  so-called  Miltonic 
way  of  writing,  as  in  Thomson's  "Seasons,"  Cowper,  Words- 
worth, to  name  a  few  of  the  most  prominent.  Dr.  John- 
son bitterly  opposed  blank  verse,  and  in  his  life  of  John 
Philips  he  said  "  he  imitated  Milton's  numbers  indeed, 
but  imitates  them  very  injudiciously.  Deformity  is  easily 
copied  ;  and  whatever  there  is  in  Milton  which  the  reader 
wishes  away,  all  that  is  obsolete,  peculiar,  or  licentious  is 
accumulated  with  great  care  by  Philips.  Milton's  verse 
was  harmonious,  in  proportion  to  the  general  state  of  our 
metre  in  Milton's  age  ;  and  if  he  had  written  after  the 
improvements  made  by  Dryden,  it  is  reasonable  to  believe 

*  The  poem  was  translated  into  Italian.  This  kind  of  writing  was  ad- 
mired then,  and  previously,  in  Italy. 


140  KtiylisJi  Literature. 

he  would  have  admitted  a  more  pleasing  modulation  of 
numbers  into  his  work."  This  was  the  statement  of  a 
prejudiced  man,  but  it  is  interesting  to  see  what  may  be 
thought  and  stated  with  approbation  in  another  time  than 
our  own. 

At  any  rate,  it  will  be  clear  that  Addison  did  not  have 
a  serious  rival  in  this  miniature  Milton.  Philips,  we  are 
told,  had  admired  Milton  from  his  tender  youth,  but  those 
who  followed  him  doubtless  belonged  to  the  romantic  half 
of  mankind,  who  revolted  from  the  reasonableness  of  those 
who  clung  to  the  heroic  measure.  Reasonableness  had 
charms  for  Addison.  In  his  preparations  for  diplomacy 
he  made  the  usual  tour  of  Europe,  and,  like  many  since 
his  time,  and  a  few  before,  he  wrote  a  book  about  his 
travels.  This  volume  has  no  great  merit,  although  the  de- 
scriptions are  even  now  precise.  As  Doudan  said,  although 
Italy  had  not  then  been  wholly  cut  up  by  the  railroad,  it 
seems  as  if  not  a  nail  had  been  driven  in  all  Italy  since 
Addison  visited  it.  But  a  good  many  things  have  been 
driven  into  the  heads  of  travellers  since  Addison  went  to 
Italy  and  compared  the  country,  as  he  found  it,  with  the 
descriptions  he  recalled  from  the  Latin  poets. 

II.  Nowadays  the  traveller  who  finds  himself  before 
St.  Mark's  in  Venice  dilates  with  various  emotions.  He 
has  Ruskin's  "  Seven  Lamps  "  and  the  "  Stones  of  Venice  " 
in  his  hand-bag,  and  the  fact  that  he  has  learned  to  admire 
other  things  in  architecture  than  the  works  of  the  ancients 
and  the  classical  imitations  of  the  Renaissance  is  another 
instance  of  the  vicissitudes  of  taste.  What  was  the 
rigorously  enforced  view  of  the  times  we  are  discuss- 
ing, we  juay  see,  for  instance,  in  Bishop  Burnet's  "  Let- 
ters from  Switzerland,  Italy,  and  Some  Parts  of  Germany, 
in  the  Years  1685  and  1686"  (Rotterdam,  1687),  p.  128. 
The  worthy  bishop  says  :  "  St.  Mark's  Church  hath  noth- 


English  Literature.  141 

ing  to  recommend  it,  but  its  great  Antiquity,  and  the 
vast  Riches  of  the  Building,  it  is  dark  and  low  ;  but  the 
pavement  is  so  rich  a  Mosaick,  and  the  whole  roof  is  also 
Mosaick,  the  outside  and  inside  are  of  such  excellent  Mar- 
ble, the  Frontispiece  is  adorned  with  so  many  Pillars  of 
Porphyry  and  Jasper,  and  above  all  with  the  four  Horses 
of  Corinthian  Brass,"  etc.,"  that  when  all  this  is  considered, 
one  doth  no  where  see  so  much  cost  brought  together." 
"The  Dome  of  Milan,"  he  says,  "hath  nothing  to  com- 
mend it  of  Architecture,  it  being  built  in  the  rude  Gothic 
manner  "  (p.  103). 

Addison  says  of  the  beautiful  cathedral  at  Sienna  : 
"  There  is  nothing  in  this  City  so  extraordinary  as  the 
Cathedral,  which  a  man  may  view  with  pleasure  after  he 
has  seen  St.  Peter's,  tho'  'tis  quite  of  another  make,  and 
can  only  be  looked  upon  as  one  of  the  Masterpieces  of 
Gothic  architecture.  When  a  man  sees  the  prodigious 
pains  and  expense  that  our  forefathers  have  been  at  in 
these  barbarous  buildings,  one  cannot  but  fancy  to  him- 
self what  miracles  of  architecture  they  would  have  left 
us,  had  they  only  been  instructed  in  the  right  way  ;  for 
when  the  devotion  of  those  ages  was  much  warmer  than 
it  is  at  present,  and  the  riches  of  the  people  much  more  at 
the  disposal  of  the  priests,  there  was  so  much  money  con- 
sumed on  these  Gothic  cathedrals,  as  would  have  finished 
a  greater  variety  of  noble  buildings  than  have  been  raised 
either  before  or  since  that  time."  He  then  goes  on  to 
describe  the  very  spouts,  "  loaden  with  ornaments  ;"  the 
windows,  "formed  like  so  many  scenes  of  perspective, 
with  a  multitude  of  little  pillars  retiring  one  behind  an- 
other ;"  the  great  "  columns  "  finely  engraven  with  fruits 
and  foliage  "that  run  twisting  about  them  from  the 
very  top  to  the  bottom  ;"  the  whole  body  of  the  church 
"  chequered  with  diff  erent.lays  of  white  and  black  marble  ;" 


142  English  Literature. 

the  pavement  "  curiously  cut  out  in  designs  and  Scripture- 
stories  and  the  Fruit  cut  with  such  a  variety  of  figures 
and  over-run  with  so  many  little  mazes  and  labyrinths  of 
Sculpture,  that  nothing  in  the  world  can  make  a  prettier 
show  to  those  who  prefer  false  beauties  and  affected  orna- 
ments to  a  noble  and  majestic  simplicity." 

Addison  and  Burnet  did  but  express  the  average  opinion 
of  their  time*  just  as  we  all  do  when  we  praise  what 


*  A  century  earlier  these  prejudices  had  not  come  into  existence.  Mon- 
taigne, in  1580,  calls  the  cathedral  at  Florence  "a  magnificent  structure, 
one  of  the  finest  and  most  sumptuous  churches  in  the  world."  See  his 
account  in  his  "  Journey  into  Italy,"  iv.  284  and  290.  Of  Sienna,  he  says, 
"  The  cathedral  church  is  very  little  inferior  to  that  of  Florence." 

Lyly's  "Euphues  and  his  England,"  1580,  Arbor's  Reprint,  p.  251: 
"But  first  they  came  to  Canterbury,  an  olde  Citie— somewhat  decayed,  yet 
beautiful  to  behold,  most  famous  for  a  Catholic  Church,  the  very  Majestic 
whereoff  stroke  them  into  a  maze." 

Coryat  in  his  "Crudities"  (edition  1611,  p.  98)  calls  Milan  cathedral  an 
"exceedingly  glorious  and  beautiful  church,"  and  that  at  Amiens,  "the 
queene  of  al  the  churches  in  France  and  the  fairest  that  ever  I  saw  till 
then"  (Id.  p.  12).  Notice,  too,  his  wild  enthusiasm  over  the  piazza  and 
church  of  St.  Mark's  (Id.  pp.  171-21G). 

Evelyn,  even  as  late  as  Oct.  25, 1644,  says :  "  The  Domo  or  Cathedral,  both 
without  and  within,  is  of  large  square  stones  of  black  and  white  marble 
polished,  of  inexpressible  beauty,  as  is  the  front  adorned  with  sculptures 
and  rare  statues.  .  .  .  The  pulpit  is  beautified  with  marble  figures,  a  piece 
of  exquisite  work ;"  and  the  next  May,  "  dined  at  Sienna  where  we  could 
not  pass  admiring  the  great  church." 

Of  St.  Mark's  he  said :  "  The  Cathedral  is  also  Gothic,  yet  for  the  pre- 
ciousness  of  the  materials,"  etc.,  "  far  exceeding  any  in  Rome,  St.  Peter's 
hardly  excepted."  "I  much  admired  the  splendid  history  of  our  Blessed 
Saviour,  composed  all  of  mosaic.  .  .  .  The  roof  is  of  most  excellent  mo- 
saic." "After  all  that  is  said,  this  church  is  in  my  opinion  much  too 
dark. and  dismal  and  of  heavy  work."  The  prejudice  against  Gothic  work 
was  not  so  bitter  then  as  it  became  after  the  Restoration.  Evelyn  also 
visited  the  cathedrals  of  Rouen  and  of  Pisa.  The  latter,  he  says,  is  superb. 
All  the  English  cathedrals  he  admired  warmly,  Canterbury,  Gloucester, 


English  Literature.  143 

they  condemned  or  overlooked.  Every  one  held  their 
view.*  President  de  Brosses,  in  one  of  his  letters  from 
Venice,  Aug.  26,  1739,  says  :  "You  know  by  reputation 
the  palace  of  St.  Mark's  ;  it  is  an  ugly  old  fellow,  if  there 
ever  was  one,  massive,  sombre,  and  Gothic,  in  the  most  ex- 
ecrable taste.  To  be  sure,  the  great  inner  courtyard  has 
something  magnificent  in  its  construction.  The  doge  lives 
in  the  palace,  but  he  has  the  worst  lodging  of  all  the  pris- 
oners of  state,  for  the  ordinary  prison,  close  by,  is  a  thor- 
oughly elegant  and  agreeable  building.  I  do  not  care  to 
linger  there  too  long,  however,  and  I  make  my  way  to  the 
church  of  St.  Mark's.  You  have  imagined  that  this  was 
an  admirable  place,  but  you  are  very  much  mistaken  ;  it 
is  a  sort  of  Greek  church,  low,  impervious  to  light,  in 
wretched  taste  both  inside  and  out.  It  is  surmounted  by 
seven  domes  lined  on  the  inside  with  mosaics  on  a  gold 
ground,  which  make  them  look  more  like  copjjer  boilers 
than  domes.  .  .  .  With  the  immense  wealth  spent  there, 
it  could  not  help  being  curious  in  spite  of  the  diabolical 
workmen  who  have  lent  a  hand  to  the  work.  From  top 
to  bottom,  inside  and  out,  the  church  is  covered  with  pict- 
ures in  mosaic  on  a  gold  ground.  .  .  .  With  the  exception 
of  the  colouring,  which  is  tolerably  well  preserved  by  the 
nature  of  the  material,  there  is  nothing  more  pitiable  than 
these  mosaics  ;  fortunately  the  artisans  took  the  wise  pre- 
caution of  writing  above  each  piece  what  it  was  intended 

etc.  York  cathedral  he  calls  "a  most  entu'C  and  magnificent  piece  of 
Gothic  architecture." 

*  Thus,  in  the  Spectator,  No.  415,  Addison  says:  "Let  any  one  reflect 
on  the  disposition  of  mind  he  finds  in  liimself  at  his  first  entrance  into 
the  Pantheon  at  Rome,  and  how  his  imagination  is  filled  with  something 
great  and  amazing ;  and  at  the  same  time  consider  how  little,  in  propor- 
tion, he  is  affected  with  the  inside  of  a  Gothic  cathedral,  though  it  be  five 
times  larger  than  the  other ;  which  can  arise  from  nothing  else  but  great- 
ness of  the  manner  in  the  one,  and  the  meanness  in  the  other." 


144  English  Literature. 

to  represent."  The  four  horses  above  the  entrance  he 
calls  the  only  thing  about  the  building  which  is  really 
worthy  of  admiration. 

The  baptistery  at  Florence  is,  he  says,  "  a  little  less 
abominable  than  the  cathedral  of  St.  Mark's."*  In  1753, 
Rousseau,  in  his  letter  on  French  Music,  said  that  counter- 
fugues,  double  fugues,  and  other  difficult  fooleries  that  the 
ear  cannot  endure  nor  the  reason  justify,  are  evidently 
relics  of  barbarism  and  bad  taste  which  survive,  like  the 
porticos  of  Gothic  churches,  to  the  disgrace  of  those  who 
had  the  patience  to  construct  them.  Voltaire,  too,  "  used 
Gothic  architecture  as  the  symbol  for  the  supreme  height 
of  rudeness  and  barbarism."  f 

In  another  respect,  Addison  was  a  man  of  his  time  ;  that 
is,  in  the  way  he  r^^arded  natural  scenery.     In  one  of  iiis 

*  Smollett,  in  "Humphrey  Clinker,"  p.  219:  "As  for  the  minster 
[of  York],  I  know  not  how  to  distinguish  it,  except  by  its  great  size  and 
the  height  of  its  spire,  from  those  other  ancient  churches  in  different 
parts  of  the  kingdom,  which  used  to  be  called  monuments  of  Gothic 
architecture ;  but  it  is  now  agreed  that  this  style  is  Saracen  lathcr  than 
Gothic ;  and  I  suppose  it  was  first  imported  into  England  from  Spain, 
great  part  of  which  was  under  the  dominion  of  the  Moors.  Those  Brit- 
ish architects  who  adopted  this  style  don't  seem  to  have  considered  the 
propriety  of  their  adoption."  These  buildings  are  suitable  in  hot  coun- 
tries on  account  of  their  coohiess,  but  "  nothing  could  be  more  preposter- 
ous than  to  imitate  such  a  mode  of  architecture  in  a  country  like  England. 
.  .  .  The  external  appearance  of  an  old  cathedral  cannot  be  but  displeas- 
ing to  the  eye  of  every  man  who  has  any  idea  of  propriety  or  proportion, 
even  though  he  may  be  ignorant  of  architecture  as  a  science :  and  the 
long  slender  spire  puts  one  in  mind  of  a  criminal  impaled,  with  a  sharp 
stake  running  up  through  his  shoulder.  These  towers,  or  steeples,  were 
likewise  borrowed  from  the  Mahometans,  who,  having  no  bells,  used  such 
minarets  for  the  purpose  of  calling  the  people  to  prayers.  .  .  .  There  is 
nothing  of  this  Arabic  architecture  in  the  assembly-room,  which  seems 
to  me  to  have  been  built  on  a  design  of  Palladio,  and  might  be  converted 
into  an  elegant  place  of  worship." 

\  .J.  Morley's  "  Rousseau,"  i.  301. 


English  Literature.  145 

letters,  dated  December,  1 701,  lie  wrote  that  he  had  reached 
Geneva  after  "  a  very  troublesome  journey  over  the  Alps. 
My  head  is  still  giddy  with  mountains  and  precipices  ; 
and  you  can't  imagine  how  much  I  am  pleased  with  the 
sight  of  a  plain."  This  little  phrase  is  a  good  illustration 
of  the  contempt  for  mountains,  of  the  way  they  were  re- 
garded as  wild,  barbaric,  forgotten,  useless  excrescences.* 
This  was  not  a  temporary  perversion  of  taste,  however, 
like  the  detestation  of  Gothic  architecture.  The  love  of 
mountains  is  something  really  of  modern,  very  modern, 
growth,  the  first  traces  of  which  we  shall  come  across  towards 
the  middle  of  the  last  century.  Before  that  time  we  find 
mountains  spoken  of  in  terms  of  the  severest  reprobation. 
Addison  in  his  Italian  travels  writes  fromThonon  :  "  There 
are  vistas  in  front  of  it  [the  town]  of  great  length,  that 
terminate  upon  the  Lake.  At  one  side  of  the  walks  you 
have  a  near  prospect  of  the  Alps,  which  are  broken  into 
so  many  steeps  and  precipices  that  they  fill  the  mind  with 
an  agreeable  kind  of  horror,  and  form  one  of  the  most  ir- 
regular misshapen  scenes  in  the  world."  As  if,  in  a  hap- 
pier world,  the  tops  of  mountains  should  be  shaped  like 
Corinthian  columns  !  Of  Berne  he  says  :  "  There  is  the 
noblest  summer-prospect  in  the  world  from  this  walk  ;  for 
you  have  a  full  view  of  a  huge  range  of  mountains  that 
lie  in  the  country  of  the  Grisons,  and  are  covered  with 
snow."  This  was  about  as  warm  an  expression  of  admi- 
ration for  mountain  scenery  as  had  been  written  up  to 
that  time.  In  the  mediaeval  books  of  travel,  in  the  ac- 
counts of  the  Crusades,  we  find  nothing  but  horror  ex- 
pressed of  the  Alps  ;  one  German  (1544)  tells  us  at  some 
length  how  his  bones  and  his  heart  quivered  as  he  stood 
at  the  top  of  the  Gemmi. 

*  Howell,  in  a  passage  quoted  below,  calls  mountains  "excrescences  of 
nature." 


146  Enyllsh  Literature. 

Evelyn  is,  perhaps,  the  single  exception,  and  even  he  is 
not  too  remote  from  his  times.  He  always  mentions, 
though  generally  without  adjectives,  the  different  views 
of  the  Alps  from  various  places  ;  but  he  found  the  jour- 
ney over  them  very  trying.  After  going  over -night 
"through  very  steep,  craggy,  and  dangerous  passages  to 
Vedra,"  .  .  .  where  "  we  had  a  very  infamous,  wretched 
lodging.  The  next  morning  we  mounted  again  through 
strange,  horrid,  and  fearfull  craggs  and  tracts,  abounding 
in  pine-trees,  and  only  inhabited  by  beares,  wolves,  and 
wild  goates  ;  nor  could  we  anywhere  see  above  a  pistol- 
shoote  before  us,  the  horizon  being  terminated  with  rocks 
and  mountains,  whose  tops  covered  with  snow  seemed  to 
touch  the  skies,  and  in  many  places  pierced  the  clouds. 
.  ,  .  The  narrow  bridges  in  some  places,  made  only  by 
felling  huge  fir-trees  and  laying  them  athwarte  from 
mountain  to  mountain  over  cataracts  of  stupendious  depth, 
are  very  dangerous,  .  .  .  and  in  some  places  we  passe 
between  mountains  that  have  been  broken  and  fallen  on 
one  another,  which  is  very  terrible,  and  one  had  neede  of  a 
sure  foote  and  steady  head  to  climb  some  of  these  preci- 
pices, besides  that  they  are  harbours  for  beares  and  wolves, 
who  have  sometimes  assaulted  travellers.  In  these  straights 
we  frequently  alighted,  now  freezing  in  the  snow,  and  anon 
frying  by  the  reverberation  of  the  sun  against  the  cliffs. 
.  .  .  The  next  morning  we  returned  our  guide,  and  tooke 
fresh  mules  and  another  to  conduct  us  to  the  Lake  of 
Geneva,  passing  through  as  pleasant  a  country  as  that  we 
had  just  travel'd  was  melancholy  and  troublesome."  On 
the  way  to  Martigny,  they  passed  "between  the  horrid 
mountains  on  either  hand."  But  later  he  says,  "we  sailed 
the  whole  length  of  the  lake,  about  thirty  miles,  the  coun- 
tries bordering  on  it  (Savoy  and  Berne)  affording  one  of 
the  most  delightful  prospects  in  the  world — the  Alps,  cov- 


English  Literature.  147 

ered  with  snow,  though  at  a  great  distance  yet  showing 
their  aspiring  tops."  And  we  find  Evelyn  continually 
sijeaking  of  beautiful  views  in  England  * — as,  for  one  ex- 

*  But  of  the  Riviera  he  said  (p.  73) :  "  All  this  coast  (except  a  httle  at 
San  Remo)  is  a  high  and  steepe  mountainous  ground,  consisting  all  of  rock 
marble,  without  any  grass,  tree,  or  rivage,  formidable  to  look  on."  Moun- 
tains, that  is,  he  found  intolerable. 

Montaigne  (iv.  263)  had  remarked  of  the  country  near  Yerona :  "The 
road  here  [was]  the  roughest  they  had  as  yet  traversed,  and  the  scenery 
was  wild  and  forbidding  in  the  highest  degree,  both  of  which  circum- 
stances were  owing  to  these  same  mountains." 

So  President  de  Brosses  says  of  the  Riviera  (i.  47)  tliat  "  there  is  al- 
ways a  precipice  on  one  side,  which  seemed  to  my  companions  a  very  poor 
invention.  There  could  be  nothing  more  beautiful,"  he  says,  "  than  the  ap- 
pearance of  all  this  shore.  .  .  .  There  are  nothing  but  well-built  and  popu- 
lous towns  and  villages." 

In  one  of  Howell's  letters  (Nov.  6,  1G21)  to  Sir  J.  H.,  from  Lyons,  he 
writes:  "I  am  now  got  over  the  Alps  and  returned  to  France.  I  had 
crossed  and  clambered  up  the  Pyraneans  to  Spain  before ;  they  are  not  so 
high  and  hideous  as  the  Alps,  but  for  our  mountains  in  Wales,  as  Eppint 
and  Penwinmaur,  which  are  so  much  cried  up  among  us,  they  are  mole- 
hills in  comparison  of  these :  they  are  but  pigmies  compared  to  giants, 
but  blisters  compared  to  imposthumes,  or  pimples  to  warts.  Besides,  our 
mountains  in  Wales  bear  always  something  useful  to  man  or  beast — some 
grass,  at  least ;  but  these  huge,  monstrous  excrescences  of  nature  bear 
nothing  (most  of  them)  but  craggy  stones :  the  tops  of  some  of  them  are 
blanched  over  all  the  year  long  with  snow,  and  those  who  drink  the  water 
have  goitre." 

Compare  letter  cliv.,  in  "  Sir  Charles  Grandison,"  describing  the  pas- 
sage of  the  Alps  :  At  Pont  Beauvoisin  "  we  bid  adieu  to  France,  and  found 
ourselves  in  Savoy,  equally  noted  for  its  poverty  and  rocky  mountains. 
Indeed,  it  was  a  total  change  of  the  scene.  We  had  left  behind  us  a 
blooming  spring,  which  enlivened  with  its  verdure  the  trees  and  hedges 
on  the  road  we  passed,  and  the  meadows  already  smiled  with  flowers.  .  .  . 
But  when  we  entered  Savoy,  nature  wore  a  very  different  face  ;  and  I  must 
own  that  my  spirits  were  great  sufferers  by  the  change.  .  .  .  The  unseason- 
able coldness  of  the  weather,  and  the  sight  of  one  of  the  worst  countries 
under  heaven.  ...  At  Lanebourg  .  .  .  every  object  which  presents  itself 
to  view  is  excessively  miserable." 


148  EngUsh  Literature. 

ample,  "  what  was  most  stupendious  to  me  was  the  rock  of 
St.  Vincent,  a  little  distance  from  the  town,  the  precipice 
whereof  is  equal  to  anything  of  that  nature  I  have  seen 
in  the  most  confragose  cataracts  of  the  Alps,  the  river 
gliding  between  them  at  an  extraordinary  depth.  ,  .  .  ' 
There  is  also  on  the  side  of  this  horrid  Alp  a  very  ro- 
mantic *  seat "  {horrid  =  awful).  I  might  quote  many  pas- 
sages in  which  he  speaks  of  beautiful  views,  but  all  that  I 
wish  to  point  out  here  is  the  non-existence  of  the  feeling 
of  admiration  for  mountain  scenery.  Nowadays,  the  fiercer 
the  mountains  the  warmer  our  raptures.  As  we  go  on,  I 
shall  try  to  make  clear  the  gradual  change  in  men's  feel- 
ings concerning  this  sort  of  natural  beauty.  We  have 
now  ascertained  what  were  the  views  that  were  current  in 
Addison's  time  and  consequently  authoritative  over  him. 

III.  Let  us  remember  that  what  we  understand  as  mod- 
ern civilization  was  new  then ;  that  all  the  thousand-and- 
one  particulars  which  make  life  comfortable  were  either 
not  known  then,  or  were  as  new  as  the  telephone  is  to  us — 
although  we  have  this  advantage,  that  we  are  accustomed 
to  inventions  and  that  new  wonders  soon  become  com- 
monplaces to  us.  Evelyn  speaks  of  a  nobleman's  house 
into  which  water  was  carried,  as  a  princely  mansion:  The 
streets  were  as  dangerous  as  a  drinking-saloon  in  a  mining 

Berkeley  (Clarendon  Press  ed.,  iv.  68),  speaking  of  crossing  Mont  Cenis 
on  New  Year's  Day,  1*714,  says  that  the  rocks  and  crags,  which  were  ter- 
rible then,  "  at  the  best  are  high,  craggy,  and  steep  enough  to  cause  the 
heart  of  the  most  valiant  man  to  melt  within  him." 

Winekelmann,  however,  admired  them  in  1755.  See  his  "  Life,"  by  Carl 
Justi,  II.  i.  7. 

Compare  with  these  Mr.  Brycc's  expressions  about  Ararat,  with  his  quo- 
tation from  Tourncfort  (a  French  botanist  at  the  beginning  of  the  eigh- 
teenth century)  in  his  "Transcaucasia  and  Ararat"  (pp.  231-233). 

*  This  must  be  one  of  the  first  instances  of  the  use  of  the  word  roman- 
tic (1654). 


English  Literature.  149 

town  on  Saturday  night.  In  1679,  Dry  den  was  set  upon 
and  cudgelled  by  ruffians  hired  by  Lord  Rochester,  be- 
cause that  nobleman  quarrelled  with  the  poet  and  his 
patron,  Lord  Mulgrave.  In  1712,  a  band  of  young  men 
callino;  themselves  Mohocks  committed  various  brutal  as- 
saults  on  unoffending  people  whom  they  met  in  the  street, 
flattening  their  noses,  gouging  out  their  eyes,  compelling 
them  to  dance  until  they  dropped  exhausted,  rolling  wom- 
en in  barrels,  etc.,  beating  the  watch,  etc.  Horace  Wal- 
pole,  in  1752,  wrote  :  "One  is  forced  to  travel  even  at 
noon  as  if  one  were  going  to  battle."  It  was  not  till  1736 
that  London  was  lit ;  before  that  time  a  lamp  was  put  be- 
fore every  tenth  house,  from  Michaelmas,  Sept.  29,  to  Lady 
Day,  March  25,  and  that  only  till  midnight  and  on  what 
were  called  dark  nights,  twenty  days  of  every  month,  the 
rest  being  supposed  to  be  lit  by  the  moon.  While  crime 
was  rampant,  prisoners  were  put  to  death  for  trivial  rea- 
sons, and  those  who  were  imprisoned  were  thereby  sen- 
tenced to  death  by  jail-fever.  Women  were  publicly 
burned.  Evelyn  mentions  somewhere  in  his  Diary  seeing 
a  woman  at  the  stake  while  he  was  on  his  way  to  look  at 
some  medals.  Yet  it  would  be  impossible  to  draw  a  full 
picture  of  the  social  life  of  the  time,  although  there  is 
an  abundance  of  material  from  which  facts  may  be  col- 
lected. When  we  come  to  the  Sjyectator  we  shall  see  a 
number  of  social  incidents  mentioned  and  commented  on. 
What  we  notice  is  the  newness  at  Addison's  time  of 
w^hat  we  understand  by  modern  life,  and  the  enormous  at- 
traction of  everything  that  stood  for  civilization  and  re- 
finement. The  age  was  in  many  ways  gross,  but  it  was  \^ 
working  with  all  possible  zeal  for  better  things,  and  it  /  V 
sought  aid  from  every  direction.  The  people  of  that  day 
had  had  enough  of  natural  forces  ;  what  they  wanted  was 
these  natural  forces  tamed  and  softened,  and  they  saw 


150  English  Literature. 

their  ideal  in  the  couplet,  in  Roman  architecture,  and  in 
smooth  landscapes.  Hence  we  comprehend  their  abhor- 
rence  of  the  old  dramatists  of  Gothic  cathedrals,  and  it 
becomes  clear  to  us  how  Addison  could  say  thai  in  view- 
ing  "  huge  heaps  of  mountains,  high  rocks  and  precipTcesj 
or  a  wide  expanse  of  waters,  we  are  not  struck  with  the 
novelty  or  beauty  of  the  sight,  but  with  that  rude  kind 
of  magnificence  which  appears  in  many  of  these  stupen- 
dous works  of  nature  "  {Spectator,  No.  412)  ;  and  "  we  find 
the  works  of  nature  still  more  pleasing  the  more  they 
resemble  those  of  art.  .  .  .  Hence  it  is  that  we  take  de- 
light in  a  prospect  which  is  well  laid  out,  and  diversified 
with  fields  and  meadows,  woods  and  rivers  ;  in  those  ac- 
cidental Landscapes  of  trees,  clouds,  and  cities  that  are 
sometimes  found  in  the  veins  of  marble  ;  in  the  curious 
fretwoi-k  of  rocks  and  grottos  ;  and,  in  a  word,  in  anything 
that  hath  such  a  variety  or  regularity  as  may  seem  the 
effect  of  design,  in  what  we  call  the  woi:kg  of  chance  " 

Just  as  now  we  look  to  science  as  the  future  corrector 
of  all  evils,  so  they  looked  to  literature  ;  and  to  expect  of 
them  that  they  should  have  looked  with  frank  enthusiasm 
at  lawless  natural  forces  would  be  like  asking  men  who 
have  just  been  saved  from  shipwreck  to  sit  on  the  rocks 
and  admire  the  heavy  surf. 

IV.  We  have  all  this  time  been  leaving  Addison  shiver- 
ing at  the  foot  of  the  Alps,  which  he  detested  ;  yet  these 
digressions  may  show  that  he  was  fitting  himself  to  speak 
to  the  men  of  his  time  in  an  authoritative  manner — not 
from  so  high  a  position  that  his  words  would  be  looked  on 
as  those  of  a  man  raised  above  all  ordinary  interests,  but 
as  those  of  one  who  had  received  the  best  training  the 
time  afforded.  While  Addison  was  getting  his  bookish 
training,  Steele,  his  future  coadjutor  in  the  Spectator,  was 


English  Literature.  151 

acquiring  a  practical  knowledge  of  the  world.  He  en- 
listed as  a  private  in  the  Coldstream  Guards,  although,  as 
he  afterwards  said,  "  when  he  mounted  a  war-horse,  "W'ith 
a  great  sword  in  his  hand,  and  planted  himself  behind 
King  William  III.  against  Louis  XIV.,  he  lost  the  succes- 
sion to  a  very  good  estate  in  the  county  of  Wexford,  in 
Ireland,  from  the  same  humour  which  he  has  preserved 
ever  since,  of  preferring  the  state  of  his  mind  to  that  of 
his  fortune." 

Lord  Cutts,  the  colonel  of  the  regiment,  made  Steele  his 
secretary,  and  got  him  an  appointment  as  ensign.  Then 
Steele  wrote  his  first  book,  "  The  Christian  Hero  ;"  as  he 
said  :  "  He  first  became  an  author  when  an  ensign  of  the 
Guards,  a  way  of  life  exposed  to  much  irregularity  ;  and 
being  thoroughly  convinced  of  many  things  of  which  he 
often  repented,  and  which  he  more  often  repeated,  he 
writ,  for  his  own  private  use,  a  little  book,  called  'The 
Christian  Hero,'  with  a  design  principally  to  fix  upon  his 
own  mind  a  strong  impression  of  virtue  and  religion  in 
opposition  to  a  stronger  propensity  to  unwarrantable 
pleasures  ;"  and,  in  short,  he  published  it  to  have  a  stronger 
reason  for  conforming  to  his  own  best  intentions.  In  this 
book  he  spoke  of  the  heroism  of  the  ancient  world  — 
for,  as  we  saw  in  Collier's  book,  the  ancients  had  to  be  ap- 
pealed to  in  proof  of  everything — but  the  greatest  prai-se 
he  gave  to  the  true  Christian,  whom  he  defined  as  "  one 
w^ho  is  always  a  benefactor  ovith  the  mien  of  a  receiver." 
The  didactic  flavor  of  the  book  he  sought  to  relieve  by  a 
comedy,  "  The  Funeral  ;  or.  Grief  a  la  Mode,"  in  which 
he  cleverly  denounced  afl^ected  mummeries  of  grief.  He 
wrote  other  comedies,  with  a  moral  tone,  in  the  new  en- 
deavor to  let  the  theatre  teach  moral  lessons  ;  in  fact,  Par- 
son Adams  said  of  Addison's  "  Cato  "  and  Steele's  "  Con- 
scious Lovers,"  that   they  were  the  only  plays  he  ever 


152  English  Literature. 

heard  of  ;  "  and  I  must  own,"  lie  says,  "  in  the  latter  there 
are  some  things  almost  solemn  enough  for  a  sermon," 

The  great  work  of  these  two  men,  as  well  as  the  most 
lasting  monument  of  their  friendship,  is  the  Spectator. 
The  credit  for  the  first  thought  of  this  belongs  to  Steele  ; 
Addison  had  equipped  himself  for  writing,  but  he  needed 
some  outside  spur  before  revealing  the  stores  of  his  intelli- 
gence and  learning  ;  Steele  had  already  written  with  this 
object  in  view,  and  he  quickly  seized  the  plan  of  publish- 
ing a  brief  daily  paper. 

The  freedom  of  the  press  had  been  one  of  the  most  for- 
tunate results  of  the  revolution  of  1688  ;  at  the  end  of  the 
session  of  1693,  the  Licensing  Act  expired,  and  Avas  not  re- 
newed. Even  before  these  formal  measures  had  secured 
liberty,  many  new  papers  had  been  established,  but  these 
had  led  a  precarious  existence  ;  it  was  only  when  the  cen- 
sorship really  disappeared  that  journalism  fairly  began  ; 
the  first  fortnight  after  the  final  abolition  of  the  censor- 
ship. May  3,  1695,  saw  the  beginning,  and  a  number  quick- 
ly followed.  These  were  wretched,  meagre  little  things, 
appearing  three  times  a  week,  printed  sometimes  on  but 
one  side  of  the  leaf,  and  announcing  the  merest  scraps  of 
news.  Soon  came  the  Flying  Post,  Avith  the  news  printed, 
and  a  blank  space  left  for  those  who  sent  the  paper  to 
their  friends  in  the  country  to  add  on  it  whatever  they 
pleased;  and  in  1702  the  first  daily  paper  appeared  in 
London.  * 

What  these  papers  and  their  successors  drove  out  was 
the  pamphlet,  written  by  Grub-street  hacks.  Politics  had 
invaded  the  stage,  where  it  appeared  in  the  songs  and  the 
prologues  and  epilogues,  but  it  was  the  anonymous  and 
scurrilous  pamphlets  that  had  more  especially  busied  them- 
selves with  this  subject.  Now,  when  discussion  was  free, 
and  needed  no  longer  to  be  carried  on  in  the  dark,  journal- 


English  Literature.  I53 

ism  gradually  attracted  the  ablest  writers,  and  the  days  of 
the  pamphlets  were  numbered.  Journalism  attained  its 
power  but  slowly.  The  first  man  who  thought  of  combin- 
ing entertainment  with  information  was  one  John  Dunton,* 
who,  March  17,  1690,  began  the  publication  of  a  penny  pa- 
per, called  first  the  Athenian  Gazette  and  then  the  Athenian 
Mercury,  or  "  A  Scheme  to  answer  a  series  of  Questions 
Monthly,  the  Querist  remaining  concealed."  The  questions 
were  such  as  might  well  have  puzzled  the  Athenian  So- 
ciety :  "  Where  was  the  soul  of  Lazarus  for  the  four  days 
he  lay  in  the  grave  ?  Suppose  Lazarus  had  an  estate  and 
bequeathed  it  to  his  Friends,  whether  ought  he  or  his 
Legatees  to  enjoy  it  after  he  was  raised  from  the  dead  ?" 
"  Where  does  extinguished  fire  go  '?"  "  Whether  the  tor- 
ments of  the  damned  are  visible  to  the  Saints?  and  vice 
versa  f''  "What  became  of  the  waters  after  the  flood?" 
"  Whether  'tis  lawful  for  a  man  to  beat  his  wife  ?" 
Other  questions  were  like  these  : 

"Wherefoi'e  is  it,  that  a  piece  of  wood  tlirown  from  liigh  to  low  into 
the  water,  together  witli  a  piece  of  lead,  stone,  or  other  hard  and  solid  body 
of  the  same  weight,  both  descending  and  falling  at  the  same  time  on  the 
water,  and  yet  the  lead,  or  a  stone,  will  sink  and  the  wood  swim  ? — Ans. 
The  wood  will  not  remain  sunk  in  the  water,  but  swim  on  the  top  there- 
of, because  it  is  aerial,  and  the  place  of  air  is  above  the  water ;  the  others 
will  sink  because  they  are  terrestrial  and  aquatick ;  but  in  the  air  the 
wood  will  descend  as  swift  as  either,  because  the  air,  as  all  other  elefiaents, 
except  fire,  do  weigh  in  their  natural  place." 

"  Wherefore  are  we  more  timorous  and  fearful  in  the  dark  and  in  the 
night  (especially  if  we  are  alone)  than  in  the  day-time,  and  in  the  light  ? 
— Ans.  Some  do  attribute  this  to  the  danger  that  may  be  apprehended  by 
knocks  and  blows,  when  we  cannot  see  from  whence  they  come.     [There 

*  In  his  "Life  and  Errors  of  John  Dunton,"  i.  188,  he  tells  us  that  he 
was  walking  in  the  street  with  a  friend  when  the  idea  of  this  publication 
struck  him.  He  at  once  exclaimed,  "  Well,  sir,  I  have  a  thought  I  would 
not  exchange  for  fifty  guineas  !" 

'7* 


154  English  Literature. 

would  seem  to  be  more  danger  of  these  if  we  were  not  alone.]  The  true 
reason  of  this  then  is,  that  the  great  enemy  of  human  kind,  being  the 
Prince  and  Lover  of  Darkness  (as  the  Psalmist  saith)  walks  in  the  dark- 
ness. [We  have  all  felt  sudden  tremors  in  the  dark]  and  the  reason 
hereof  may  be  that  there  is  some  evil  spirit  that  we  dread,  without  seeing 
of  it." 

"  Why  are  the  shadows  of  the  sun  more  short  at  mid-day,  than  in  the 
morning  or  at  evening  ?" 

"  Were  all  the  creatures  (as  well  as  the  serpent)  vocal  in  Paradise  as 
all  the  trees  were  in  the  Dodonian  Wood  ?  Or  was  it  the  serpent  only  ? 
If  the  last,  how  came  that  to  deserve  the  benefit  of  speech  above  the  rest  ? 
— Alls.  The  serpent  only,  which,  in  a  few  words,  has  but  just  outrivalled 
the  mischief  of  such  questions." 

"  Why  should  the  serpent  creep  upon  his  belly,  for  his  penalty  ?  Or 
did  he  walk  upon  his  tail  before  ?" 

"  Whether  is  the  more  noble,  man  or  woman  ?" 

Still,  questions  which  we  shall  see  later  discussed  in  the 
Spectator  are  broached  here,  e.  g. : 

"  Is  it  expedient  that  women  should  be  learned  ?  —  Ans.  Knowledge 
puffeth  up  the  mind  ;  therefore  if  women  were  learned,  they  would  be 
prouder  and  more  insupportable  than  before.  Besides,  a  good  opinion  of 
themselves  is  inconsistent  with  the  obedience  they  are  designed  for. 
Therefore  God  gave  knowledge  to  Adam  and  not  to  Eve,  who  by  the  bare 
desire  of  knowledge  destroyed  all." 

"  Why  are  they  not  learned  as  men  ;  are  they  not  capable  to  become 
such  ?     Why  have  they  not  solidity  of  judgment  ?" 

"  Whether  it  is  prudent  to  lodge  in  a  room  haunted  by  spirits  ? — Aim, 
"  A  good  man  may,  bad  men  should  not  tempt  the  Devil." 

"  Of  what  form  was  the  serpent  in  Paradise,  and  whether  such  a  sort  of 
creature  were  not  more  likely  to  frighten  than  tempt  Eve  ?  —  Ans.  To 
tempt  a  woman  it  is  reasonable  to  conjecture  that  it  had  a  man's  face,  for 
there  are  such  snakes  in  Madagascar." 

Dunton,  and  a  few  of  his  friends,  forming  the  Athenian 
Society,  as  they  called  it,  answered  these  and  absurder 
questions  with  inexhaustible  seriousness.  It  may  be  worth 
while  to  notice  that  one  of  this  society  was  Samuel  Wes- 
ley, Dunton's  brother-in-law,  and  father  of  the  founder  of 


English  Literatm^e.  155 

Methodism.  They  were  once  badly  deceived.  *  Thus, 
they  were  asked  this  question  :  "  Since  in  your  Advertise- 
ment you  make  it  known  that  a  Chyrurgeon  is  taken  into 
your  Society,  I  have  thought  lit  to  propound  the  follow- 
ing Question,  withal  assuring  you  that  the  matter  of  the 
Fact  is  true.  A  Sailor  on  board  the  Fleet,  by  an  unlucky 
Accident  broke  his  Leg,  being  in  Drink,  and  refusing  the 
assistance  of  the  Surgeon  of  the  Ship,  called  for  a  piece 
of  new  Tarpauling  that  lay  on  the  Deck,  which  he  rolled 
some  turns  round  his  Leg,  tying  up  all  close  with  a  few 
Iloop-sticks,  and  was  able  immediately  after  to  walk  round 
the  ship,  never  keeping  his  Bed  one  Day.  I  would  know 
whether  the  Cure  is  to  be  attributed  to  the  Emplastic 
Nature  of  the  tarr'd  and  pitched  Cloth  bound  on  strait 
with  the  Hoop-sticks,  &c.,  or  rather  whether  it  may  not 
be  solved  according  to  the  Cartesian  Philosophy  ?" 

The  concealed  querist  had  the  pleasure  of  receiving  a 
serious  though  vague  reply  concerning  fractures,  tarred 
cloth,  and  Copernicus,  from  the  club,  who  did  not  see  that 
he  spoke  of  a  wooden  leg. 

Besides  discharging  this  delicate  duty,  the  paper — at 
first  weekly,  then  twice  a  week — gave  a  list  of  books  to  be 
studied  in  such  subjects  as  history,  divinity,  poetry,  etc., 
English  and  foreign.  This  may  seem  to  us  its  most  im- 
portant function:  but  the  Marquis  of  Halifax  used  to  read 
these  questions  and  answers  ;  Sir  William  Temple  used 
even  to  send  questions  ;  and  Dunton  received  poems  from 
Tate  and  Defoe,  and  Swift  sent  his  "  Ode  to  the  Athenian 
Society "  to  the  society  itself,  with  a  request  that  they 
print  it.  His  letter,  which  is  published  with  the  ode,  will 
show  how  considerable  was  the  reputation  of  this  club. 

*  Vide  Beljame,  p.  272,  who  copies  it  from  the  original  paper.  Nat- 
urally, it  was  not  reprinted  in  bound  volumes. 


156  English  Literature. 

Defoe  was  the  most  eminent  of  Dunton's*  imitators, 
beginning  the  publication  of  his  Weekly  JRevieto  of  the 
Affairs  of  France :  Purged  from  the  Errors  and  Par- 
tiality of  Neios-tor  iters  and  Petty -Statesmen  of  all  Sides. 
This  contained  mnch  serious  political  discussion  in  which 
Defoe  did  his  best  to  make  i:)lain  to  his  English  readers 
the  true  condition  of  France,  and  at  the  end  came  a  part 
of  the  paper  called  the  Mercure  Scandale,  or  later  Scan- 
dalous, and  then  Scatidal,  Club,  which  contained  answers 
to  questions,  the  discussion  of  various  social  matters,  at- 
tacks on  drunkenness,  swearing,  duelling,  etc. ;  the  Peview 
lived  till  May,  1713,  but  it  is  now  known  better  as  the 
model  of  the  Tatler  than  for  anything  else. 

You  will  notice  the  steps  by  which  the  periodical  grew. 
Steele  saw  Defoe's  success,  and  began  the  Tatler ;  this 
appeared  at  first  three  times  a  week,  on  jiost-days,  as  did 
the  Pevieui.  But,  while  both  journals  supported  the  same 
side  in  politics,  Steele  made  the  political  part  subordinate 
to  the  social  essays,  while  Defoe  did  the  reverse.  Steele, 
too,  was  at  the  time  the  director  of  the  London  Gazette, 
so  that  he  had  the  first  sight  of  jjolitical  news.  The  politi- 
cal part  faded  away  soon,  after  Addison  had  joined  him — 
he  began  with  No.  18 — and  the  paper  busied  itself  with 

*  Dunton  visited  this  country  in  1685-6,  and  thus  described  Cambridge 
in  one  of  his  letters  :  "  This  town  is  one  of  the  neatest  and  best-compacted 
towns  in  the  whole  country.  It  has  many  stately  structures  and  well- 
contrived  streets  which  for  handsomeness  and  beauty  outdoes  Boston 
itself."  At  the  college  he  "found  eight  or  ten  young  fellows,  sitting 
around,  smoking  tobacco,  with  the  smoke  of  which  the  room  was  so  full 
that  you  could  hardly  see,  and  the  whole  house  smelt  so  strong  of  it,  that 
when  I  was  going  upstairs,  I  said,  this  is  certainly  a  tavern."  The  stu- 
dents, he  adds,  "  could  hardly  speak  a  word  of  Latin,  so  that  my  comrade 
could  not  converse  with  them.  They  took  us  to  the  library,  where  there 
was  nothing  particular.  We  looked  over  it  a  little."  This  was  the  time 
he  spoke  of  Bunyan.      Vide  supra,  p.  35,  note. 


English  Literature.  157 

social  matters,  Steele  saw,  however,  greater  possibili- 
ties before  himself  and  Addison,  and  so,  Jan.  2,  1710-11, 
the  Tatler  was  allowed  to  expire,  and  in  the  following 
March  the  first  number  of  the  Spectator  appeared,  simply 
as  a  literary  journal,  and  every  week-day,  two  important 
innovations. 

It  would  be  easy,  but  it  would  be  unfair,  to  sneer  at  the 
Tatler  and  the  Spectator  ;  it  is  true  that  some  of  the  papers 
concern  themselves  with  teaching  rudimentary  virtues,  or 
the  rudiments  of  the  virtues,  and  that  they  are  filled  with 
praise  of  sentiments  which  we  associate  with  copy-books. 
The  essayist  of  the  present  time,  as  I  think  Mr.  Leslie 
Stephen  pointed  out,  has  to  leave  the  beaten  track  and 
show,  for  instance,  how  punctuality  leads  to  the  waste 
of  time,  how  good-nature  exposes  a  man  to  imposition, 
and  to  abuse  by  mischief-makers,  etc.,  etc.  Then  they 
proved  platitudes — platitudes  meaning  trite  truths  ;  now 
we  amuse  ourselves  by  picking  flaws  in  the  demonstra- 
tion. 

In  his  "  History  of  English  Literature,"  Taine  picks  out 
some  light,  frivolous  matter,  and  says  that  it  is  what  Eng- 
lish-speaking people  call  humor,  leaving  it  to  be  understood 
that  English-speaking  people  do  not  know  what  humor  is — 
which  is  a  hasty  statement — and  then  he  goes  on  to  prove 
that  Addison,  beneath  all  his  cultivation,  is  an  Englishman, 
and  has  many  sides  which  do  not  please  the  French.  He  has 
Protestant  prejudices,  he. preaches,  he  treats  his  readers  as 
if  they  were  children,  he  refuses  to  discuss  politics,  etc., 
etc. ;  but  these  qualities  combine  to  show  how  exactly  fitted 
Addison  was  to  fill  the  position  he  had  chosen.  Collier's 
remarks  on  the  stage  leave  upon  the  reader  an  impression 
of  an  earnest  but  clumsy  and  angry  theologian.  It  was  in 
comparison  with  such  men,  and  Collier  was  in  many  ways 
the  best  of  the  class,  that  Addison  is  to  be  judged.     His 


158  English  Literature. 

French  contemporaries  addressed  a  witty,  polished  public, 
capable  of  perceiving  half-truths,  sensitive  to  implication, 
full  of  literary  tact  and  knowledge ;  Addison  wrote  for 
women  who  actually  had  nothing  to  read  except  the  trans- 
lation of  long-winded  ronia,nce^3^^^  men  who  cared 
for  nothing  but  open-air  pleasures,  or  the  plays  of  tlie 
time.  How  they  were  brought  by  ingenious  variety  anJ  aT 
due  mixture  of  entertainment  with  instruction  to  become 
a  reading  public,  we  may  learn  from  a  few  stray  notices  in 
contemporary  publications.  One  man  says  that  he  used 
to  collect  his  neighbors — "taking  care  not  to  alarm  the 
country  gentlemen  by  any  premature  mention  of  antiqui- 
ties, he  endeavored  at  first  to  allure  them  into  the  more 
flowery  paths  of  literature.  In  1709  a  few  of  them  were 
brought  together  every  post-day  in  the  coffee-house  in  the 
Abbey  Yard ;  and  after  one  of  the  party  had  read  aloud 
the  last  published  number  of  the  Taller,  they  proceeded  to 
talk  over  the  subject  among  themselves."  And  elsewhere, 
"  the  gentlemen  met  after  church  on  Sunday  to  read  the 
news  of  the  week;  the  Spectators  were  read  as  regularly  as 
the  JournaV  The  " general  reader"  was  now  born,  and 
w^as  at  once  pampered.  After  Collier's  harshness  came 
gentle  words  like  these  :  "  I  cannot  be  of  the  same  opinion 
with  my  friends  and  fellow-labourers,  the  Reformers  of 
Manners,  in  their  severity  towards  plays  ;  but  must  allow, 
that  a  good  play,  acted  before  a  well-bred  audience,  must 
raise  very  proper  incitements  to  good  behaviour,  and  must 
be  the  most  quick  and  most  prevailing  method  of  giving 
young  people  a  turn  of  sense  and  good-breeding."  Humor 
like  this  must  have  come  as  a  revelation:  Mr.  Bickerstaff 
meets  Ned  Softly,  who  insists  on  reading  to  him  a  sonnet 
he  had  written  upon  a  lady 

"  who  showed  me  some  verses  of  hor  own  making,  and  is,  perhaps,  the 
best  poet  of  her  age : 


English  Literature.  159 

" '  To  MiRA,  ON  Her  Incomparable  Poems. 

I. 

"  '  When  dressed  in  laurel  wreaths  you  shine, 

And  tune  your  soft  melodious  notes, 

You  seem  a  sister  of  the  Nine 

Or  Phoebus'  self  in  petticoats. 

II. 
"  'I  fancy  when  your  song  you  sing, 

(Your  song  you  sing  with  so  much  art), 
Your  pen  was  plucked  from  Cupid's  wing; 
For,  all !  it  wounds  me  like  his  dart.' 

" '  Why,'  says  I,  '  this  is  a  little  nosegay  of  conceits,  a  very  lump  of 
salt,  every  verse  has  something  in  it  that  piques ;  and  then  the  dart  in 
the  last  line  is  certainly  as  pretty  a  sting  in  the  tail  of  an  epigram,  for  so 
I  think  you  critics  call  it,  as  ever  entered  into  the  thought  of  a  poet.' — 
'Dear  Mr.  Bickerstaff,'  says  he,  shaking  me  by  the  hand,  'everybody 
knows  you  to  be  a  judge  of  these  things ;  and  to  tell  you  truly,  I  read 
over  Roscommon's  translation  of  Horace's  "  Art  of  Poetry  "  thi'ee  several 
times  before  I  sat  down  to  write  the  sonnet  which  I  have  shown  you. 
But  you  shall  hear  it  again,  and  pray  observe  every  line  of  it ;  for  not 
one  of  them  shall  pass  without  your  approbation : 

"  '  When  dressed  in  laurel  wreaths  you  shine — ' 

'  That  is,'  says  he,  '  when  you  have  your  garland  on ;  when  you  are 
writing  verses.'  To  which  I  replied,  '  I  know  your  meaning ;  a  meta- 
phor ?' — '  The  same,'  said  he,  and  went  on : 

" '  And  tune  your  soft  melodious  notes — ' 

'  Pray  observe  the  gliding  of  that  verse ;  there  is  scarce  a  consonant  in 
it ;  I  took  care  to  make  it  run  upon  liquids.  Give  me  your  opinion  of 
it.' — 'Truly,'  said  T,  'I  think  it  as  good  as  the  former.' — 'I  am  very  glad 
to  hear  you  say  so,'  says  he,  '  but  mind  the  next : 

"  '  You  seem  a  sister  of  the  Nine — ' 

'  That  is,'  says  he, '  you  seem  a  sister  of  the  Muses ;  for  if  you  look  into 
ancient  authors,  you  will  find  it  was  their  opinion,  that  there  were  nine  of 
them.' — '  I  remember  it  very  well,'  said  I,  '  but  pray  proceed.' 

****** 

" '  Pray  observe  the  turn  of  words  in  these  lines.     I  was  a  whole  hour 


i6o  English  Literature. 

in  adjusting  of  them,  and  have  still  a  doubt  upon  me,  whether  in  the  sec- 
ond line  it  should  be  your  song  you  sing,  or,  you  sing  your  song.  You 
shall  hear  them  both  : 

"  '  1  fancy  when  you  sing  your  song, 
•  (Your  song  you  sing  with  so  much  art),' 

or, 

"  '  I  fancy  when  your  song  you  smg, 

(You  sing  your  song  with  so  much  art),'  "  etc. 

Trifling  of  this  sort  must  have  been  a  delightful  relief 
from  the  dull  preaching  of  the  other  writers  ;  it  was  a 
new  note  to  the  people  of  those  days,  and  while  there  have 
been  plenty  of  writers  who  have  amassed  statistics,  and 
have  spoken  in  praise  of  virtue  and  in  denunciation  of 
vice,  those  who  may  be  called  amusing  are  still  few.  The 
Tatler  began,  doubtless,  with  no  other  plan  in  Steele's  head 
than  that  of  furnishing  an  entertaining  paper;  but  when 
Addison  joined  him,  as  Steele  said,  "  I  fared  like  a  dis- 
tressed prince  who  calls  in  a  powerful  neighbour  to  his 
aid.  I  was  undone  by  my  auxiliary ;  when  I  had  once 
called  him  in,  I  could  not  subsist  without  dependence  on 
him."  Addison  very  early  announced  his  plan  in  the  Spec- 
tator ;  in  the  tenth  number,  after  having  described  in 
earlier  papers  the  imaginary  club  to  which  the  Spectator 
belonged,  he  says  that  his  publisher  has  told  him  that  three 
thousand  are  published  every  day,  with  probably  twenty 
readers  of  each  copy,  so  that  he  boasts  of  an  audience  of 
sixty  thousand.  "  Since  I  have  raised  to  myself  so  great 
an  audience,  I  shall  spare  no  pains  to  make  their  instruction 
agreeable,  and  their  diversion  useful  ...  to  refresh  their 
memories  from  day  to  day,  till  I  have  recovered  them  out 
of  that  desperate  state  of  vice  and  folly  into  which  the 
age  is  fallen.  ...  It  was  said  of  Socrates,*  that  he  brought 

*  A  French  translation  of  tlie  Spectator  (6  vols.,  Amsterdam,  1714-26), 
was  entitled,  Le  Spedateur,  ou  le  Socrate  niodcrne,  oil  Von  voit  un  portrait 
naif  des  moeurs  de  ce  siecle. 


English  Literature.  i6i 

philosophy  down  from  heaven,  to  inhabit  among  men;  and 
I  shall  be  ambitious  to  have  it  said  of  me,  that  I  have 
brought  philosophy  out  of  closets  and  libraries,  schools 
and  colleges,  to  dwell  in  clubs  and  assemblies,  at  tea-tables 
and  in  coifee-houses.  ,  .  . 

"  Sir  Francis  Bacon  once  observes,  that  a  well-written 
book  compared  with  its  rivals  and  antagonists,  is  like 
Moses'  Serpent,  that  immediately  swallowed  up  and  de- 
voured those  of  the  Egyptians.  I  shall  not  be  so  vain  as 
to  think  that  when  the  Spectator  appears  the  other  public 
prints  will  vanish  ;  but  shall  leave  it  to  my  reader's  con- 
sideration, whether,  is  it  not  much  better  to  be  let  into  the 
knowledge  of  ones-self,  than  to  hear  what  passes  in  Mus- 
covy or  Poland  ;  and  to  amuse  ourselves  with  such  writ- 
ings as  tend  to  the  wearing  out  of  ignorance,  passion, 
and  prejudice,  than  such  as  naturally  conduce  to  inflame 
hatreds  and  make  enmities  irreconcilable  ?" 

The  club  which  he  described  with  such  care  in  Nos.  1, 
2,  and  34  was  doubtless  intended  for  a  sort  of  copy  of  the 
Athenian  Society.  It  survived  in  many  of  the  imitations 
of  the  Spectator,  in  the  "  Noctes  Ambrosianse,"  and  in  the 
imaginary  clubs  of  a  number  of  magazines  down  to  a  very 
recent  date. 

Addison  had  a  great  many  arrows  to  his  bow.  At  one 
time  he  ridicules  ladies'  head-dresses  :  "  There  is  not  so 
variable  a  thing  in  nature  as  a  lady's  head-dress.  Within 
my  own  memory  I  have  known  it  rise  and  fall  above  thir- 
ty degrees.  About  ten  years  ago  it  shot  up  to  a  very  great 
height,  insomuch  that  the  female  part  of  our  species  were 
much  taller  than  the  men." 

Similar  social  playfulness  may  be  found  in  Nos.  101, 
275,  and  281.  These  papers  certainly  are  not  marked  by 
startling  humor,  though  they  have  served  as  models  for 
countless  imitators.     However,  Addison  knew  very  well 


i62  English  Liicraturc. 

what  he  was  about,  and  never  forgot  tliat  lie  was  address- 
ing a  mixed  audience,  composed  of  peo])le  with  very  dif- 
ferent tastes,  and  that  to  phrase  this  moth'y  juiblic  he  had 
to  intersperse  the  serious  discussion  of  such  matters  as 
the  immortality  of  the  soul,  intidelity,  Milton,  with  lighter 
papers  that  should  catch  the  attention  of  frivolous  readers. 
People  who  cared  for  nothing  more  serious  than  badiuaiie 
about  the  twirling  of  fans,  or  the  ridiculous  size  of  hoops, 
or  the  placing  of  patches,  had  to  be  kept  in  good  humor 
with  an  abundance  of  such  material  in  order  to  niakc  the 
Spectator  a  success.  The  light  papers  of  this  sort  were 
always  in  good  taste  according  to  the  canons  of  that  aoe, 
and  their  number,  though  great,  was  not  too  large  in  view 
of  the  follies  they  attacked. 

There  is  one  undeniable  nu'rit  in  the  SjKcfafor,  and  that 
is  the  endless  variety  of  tlie  subjects  treated.  The  essays 
themselves  Avill  teach  this  better  tlian  the  nuist  copious 
extracts. 

V.  Tlie  part  that  we  should  read  last,  and  yet  the  one 
that  has  had  a  very  imjtortant  influence  on  English  litera- 
ture, is  the  long  discussion  on  ^Milton.  AVe  have  already 
noticed  the  indifference  with  which  that  great  })oet  was 
treated  by  his  contemjioraries  and  successors,  and  we  have 
seen  evidence  of  the  neglect  with  which  most  of  the  great- 
est English  writers  were  treated  in  this  modern  dispensa- 
tion. Yet  already  in  the  Tatler  attention  had  been  called 
to  Bacon,  Spenser,  Ben  Jonson,  Milton,  and  Shakspere,  but 
this  was  done  by  incidental  references  ;  in  the  Spectator 
Addison  set  seriously  to  work  to  put  IMilton  in  his  proper 
place.  I  say  that  we  do  not  read  these  papers  with  de- 
light, and,  in  proof  of  this  assertion,  I  beg  leave  to  quote 
some  of  Addison's  arguments  in  behalf  of  Milton's  excel- 
lence. Take  this,  for  instance  :  "  The  third  qualification 
of  an  epic  poem  is  its  greatness.     The  anger  of  Achilles 


EwjlUk  Literature.  163 

was  of  such  consequence,  that  it  ernhroih::d  the  kings  of 
Greece,  destroyed  the  heroes  of  Troy,  and  engaged  all  the 
gods  in  factions,  -^neas's  settlement  in  Italy  produced 
the  C'jfcsars,  and  gave  hirth  to  the  ]loman  Empire,  Mil- 
ton's suhject  was  still  greater  than  either  of  the  former  ; 
it  does  not  determine  tlie  fate  of  single  persons  or  nations, 
but  of  a  whole  species."  That  is  to  say,  Aristotle  says  an 
ej>ic  poem  must  he  this,  that,  and  the  other,  Milton's 
poem  is  this,  that,  and  the  other  ;  er<jo,  it  is  an  epic  poem, 
Jri  other  words,  he  was  using  in  his  arguments  the  lan- 
guage of  the  schools,*  Aristotle  lay  heavy  over  all  the 
modem  literature,  and  Horace's  "Ars  Poetica"  was  look- 
ed upon  by  every  educated  person  as  little  else  than  an 
inspired  work.  All  Europe  lay  in  intellectual  bondage, 
not  to  Greece  so  much  as  to  the  Latin  Greece,  which  bore 
somewhat  the  same  resemblance  to  the  original  that  Ger- 
man-silver does  to  the  nobler  metal,  whose  name  alone, 
without  the  brightness,  the  domestic  imitation  has  taken. 
Horace's   dictum,  "  Ut  pictura,  poesis,"  was   the   first 

*  In  his  own  day,  and  later,  however,  Addison  seenie<l  to  be  making  con- 
cessions to  the  effeminacy  of  his  age.  Thus  Dr.  .Johnson,  in  his  "  Life  of 
Addison,"  says:  "Had  he  presented  'Paradise  Lost'  with  all  the  pomp 
of  system  and  severity  of  science,  the  criticism  would  perhaps  have  been 
admired,  and  the  poem  still  have  been  neglected;  but  by  the  blandish- 
ments of  gentleness  and  facility  he  has  made  Milton  an  universal  favorite 
with  wli(jtn  readers  of  every  class  think  it  necessary  to  be  pleased." 

\)Y.  Iliird  (quoted  in  Knox's  "  Ilssays,"  No.  21)  said :  '•  For  what  w>ncem8 
his  criticism  of  Milton  in  particular,  and  as  to  his  own  proper  observation, 
they  are,  for  the  most  part,  so  general  and  indeterminate  as  to  afford  but 
little  instruction  to  the  reader,  and  are  not  infrequently  altogether  frivo- 
lous" !     Nowadays  one  would  hardly  call  them  frivolous. 

Even  towards  the  end  of  the  last  century,  P.  Stockdale  said :  "A  sacri- 
legious contempt  hath  been  expressed  for  that  elegant  critick's  beautiful 
papers  in  the  HpedoJor,  on  the  '  Paradise  Lost.'  " — "  Lectures  on  English 
Poets,"  i.  41  (1807,  but  written  ten  or  twelve  years  earlier). 


164  English  Literature. 

commandment ;  the  next,  imitate  nature  ;  the  third  and 
last,  everything  must  announce  and  assist  the  cause  of 
virtue  :  it  was  in  compliance  with  this  rule  that  King 
Lear  climbed  into  his  throne  again  ;  that  the  "  Maid's 
Tragedy "  became  a  comedy  ;  that  even  now  we  see  in 
old-fashioned  plays  a  fortune  and  a  bride  awaiting  the 
hero  when,  at  about  a  quarter  to  eleven  o'clock,  all  the 
actors  form  a  semicircle  on  the  stage  and  the  green  cur- 
tain shows  signs  of  animation.  Life,  we  all  know,  from 
reading  moralists,  is  full  of  disappointment  ;  the  youth 
starts  out  to  set  the  world  right  and  to  earn  wealth  while 
he  is  young  enough  to  enjoy  it,  but  we  are  told  that  he 
finds  his  illusions  destroyed  on  every  side,  that  he  loses 
his  high  ideals,  and  is  content  with  comfortable  compro- 
mise. We  also  instruct  writers  to  paint  life  as  they  see 
it ;  yet  if  one  of  them  fails  to  make  everything  smooth  at 
the  end,  and  draws  what  we  know  to  be  the  inevitable 
truth,  we  are  disappointed,  and  we  denounce  the  man  who 
has  learned  his  lesson  as  a  foe  to  his  kind.  Possibly  our 
grandchildren  may  find  innocent  amusement  in  discuss- 
ing us. 

At  any  rate,  we  do  not  make  up  our  minds  about  the 
merit  of  a  poem  by  the  same  processes  as  did  those  who 
read  Addison's  papers  in  the  Sjyectator ;  we  do  not  keep 
one  eye  on  the  pseudo-Latin  critics  and  one  on  the  text  to 
find  warrant  for  our  opinions  ;  yet,  in  writing  as  he  did, 
Addison  simply  followed  the  legitimate  methods  of  his 
time.  By  a  singular  turn  of  fate,  while  he  seemed  to  be 
blocking  the  way  by  this  old-fashioned  lumber,  he  was 
really  smoothing  the  path  for  us.  We  shall  see  in  a  mo- 
ment how  he  did  this.  What  prejudices  Addison  had  to 
attack,  besides  those  we  have  already  seen,  were  such  as 
we  find  in  this  passage  from  Dryden's  dedication  of  his 
Juvenal  and  Persius  (1G92)  :  ''As  for  Mr.  Milton,  whom 


English  Literature.  165 

we  all  admire  with  so  much  justice,  his  subject  is  not  that 
of  a  heroic  poem,  properly  so  called  :  his  design  is  the 
losing  of  our  happiness  ;  his  event  is  not  j^rosperous,  like 
that  of  all  other  epique  works  ;  his  heavenly  machines  are 
many,  and  his  human  persons  are  but  two."  That  is  the 
point ;  I  merely  add  this  as  a  side-matter  :  "  Neither  will 
I  justify  Milton  for  his  blank  verse,  though  I  may  excuse 
him  by  the  example  of  Hannibal  Caro  *  and  other  Italians 
w^ho  have  used  it ;  for,  whatever  causes  he  alleges  for  the 
abolishing  of  rhyme,  .  .  .  his  own  particular  reason  is 
plainly  this,  that  rhyme  was  not  his  talent  ;  he  had  neither 
the  ease  of  doing  it  nor  the  graces  of  it."  Rapin,  who 
held  a  position  as  -a  critic  which  no  one  of  his  successors 
has  ever  reached,  said  of  Aristotle's  law^s  :  "  There  is  no 
arriving  at  perfection  but  by  these  rules,  and  they  certain- 
ly go  astray  that  take  a  different  course.  .  .  .  And  if  a 
poem  made  by  the  rules  fails  of  success,  the  fault  lies  not 
in  the  art,  but  in  the  artist  ;  all  who  have  writ  of  this  art 
have  followed  no  other  idea  but  that  of  Aristotle  ;"  and 
of  style  :  "  What  is  good  on  this  subject  is  all  taken  from 
Aristotle,  who  is  the  only  source  whence  good  sense  is  to 
be  drawn,  when  one  goes  about  to  write."  Addison,  then, 
was  compelled  to  prove  that  Milton  was  good  by  showing 
his  conformity  to  Aristotelian  rules,  and  this  he  did. 

We  must  remember  that  this  superstitious  respect  for 
Aristotle  is  capable  of  very  simple  explanation.  Our 
classical  dictionaries  tell  us  what  that  wonderful  man  ac- 
complished, but  fully  to  recount  his  influence  would  be, 
almost  to  rewrite  mediaeval  history.  It  filled  not  Eu- 
rope alone.  One  writer  says  of  him  :  "  Translated  in  the 
fifth  century  of  the  Christian  era  into  the  Syriac  language 
by  the  Nestorians  w^ho  fled  into  Persia,  and  from  Syriac 

*  Caro  (1507-66)  translated  the  "  Jilneid  "  into  blank  verse. 


1 66  English  Literature. 

into  Arabic  four  hundred  years  later,  his  writings  furnish- 
ed the  Mohammedan  conquerors  of  the  East  with  a  germ 
of  science,  which,  but  for  the  effect  of  their  religious  and 
political  institutions,  might  have  shot  up  into  as  tall  a  tree 
as  it  did  produce  in  the  West ;  while  his  logical  works,  in 
the  Latin  translation  which  Boethius,  '  the  last  of  the  Ro- 
mans,' bequeathed  as  a  legacy  to  posterity,  formed  the 
basis  of  that  extraordinai-y  phenomenon,  the  Philosophy 
of  the  Schoolmen,  An  empire  like  this,  extending  over 
nearly  twenty  centuries  of  time,  sometimes  more,  some- 
times less  despotically,  but  always  with  great  force,  rec- 
ognized in  Bagdad  and  in  Cordova,  in  Egypt  and  in 
Britain,  and  leaving  abundant  traces  of  itself  in  the  lan- 
guage and  modes  of  thought  of  every  European  nation, 
is  assuredly  without  a  parallel "  (Blakesley,  p.  1,  quoted 
in  G.  H.  Lewes's  "  Biographical  History  of  Philosophy," 
i.  245). 

His  position  in  Europe  during  the  Middle  Ages  was 
most  firm.  Marlowe's  Dr.  Faustus,  at  the  opening  of  the 
play  of  that  name,  bids  himself  "  live  and  die  in  Aristotle's 
works."  "  Aristotle's  logic  and  physics,  together  with  the 
Ptolemaic  system  of  astronomy,  were  then  considered  as 
inseparable  portions  of  the  Christian  creed"  (Lewes,  ii. 
378).  "Li  1624  .  .  .  the  Parliament  of  Paris  issued  a  de- 
cree banishing  all  who  publicly  maintained  theses  against 
Aristotle  ;  and  in  1629,  at  the  urgent  remonstrance  of  the 
Sorbonne,  decreed  that  to  contradict  the  principles  of 
Aristotle  was  to  contradict  the  Church  !  There  is  an 
anecdote  recorded  somewhere  of  a  student,  who,  having 
detected  spots  in  the  sun,  communicated  his  discovery  to 
a  worthy  priest  :  '  My  son,'  replied  the  priest,  '  I  have  read 
Aristotle  many  times,  and  I  assure  you  there  is  nothing  of 
the  kind  mentioned  by  him.  Go  rest  in  peace  ;  and  be 
certain  that  the  spots  which  you  have  seen  are  in  your 


Engltsh  Literature.  167 

eyes  and  not  in  the  sun.' "  He  narrowly  escaped  being 
canonized  for  a  saint.  Bruno  defied  Aristotle,  and  said 
the  earth  revolved  on  its  axis  ;  the  Aristotelians  affirmed 
that  the  earth  did  not  move,  and  to  confirm  their  views, 
after  keeping  Bruno  six  years  in  prison  at  Venice,  they 
burned  him  in  1599. 

The  authority  which  Aristotle  exercised  in  physics  and 
loo-ic  ran  over  into  literature,  as  we  shall  see  more  fully 
when  we  come  to  discuss  Addison's  "  Cato  ;"  and  possibly 
our  grandfathers  clung  the  more  obstinately  to  his  literary 
laws  because  they  had  been  compelled  to  give  ground  else- 
where.* The  necessity,  then,  under  which  Addison  labored, 
of  proving  everything  by  Aristotle's  rules  has  left  those 
essays,  after  receiving  the  praise  of  several  generations  of 
men,  to  gather  dust  on  forgotten  shelves.  They  are  like 
disused  fords  over  a  stream,  which  we  look  at  from  a  car- 
window  as  we  rattle  over  the  new  huge  bridge.  They 
have  become  curiosities. 

As  an  example  of  this  method,  see  the  following  extracts  : 

Spectator,  No.  273  :  "  Having  examined  the  Action  of  '  Paradise  Lost,' 
let  us  in  the  next  place  consider  the  Actors.  This  is  Aristotle's  Method 
of  considering,  first  the  Fable,  and  secondly  the  Manners;  or,  as  we  gen- 
erally call  them  in  English,  the  Fable  and  the  Characters. 

"  Homer  has  excelled  all  the  Heroic  Poets  that  ever  wrote,  in  the  Mul- 
titude and  Variety  of  his  Characters. 

****** 

"  Virgil  falls  infinitely  short  of  Homer  in  the  Characters  of  his  Poem, 
both  as  to  their  Variety  and  Novelty.  Jineas  is,  indeed,  a  perfect  Char- 
acter, but  as  for  Achates,  tho'  he  is  stiled  the  Hero's  Friend,  he  does  noth- 
ing in  the  whole  Poem  which  may  deserve  that  title.     Gyas,  Mnesteus,  Ser- 

*  Then,  too,  science  is  more  pliant  because  it  deals  with  facts  and  rests 
upon  reason.  Literature  is  slower  to  change,  because  it  depends  to  a 
great  extent  on  the  emotions.  Religion  obviously  moves  the  last  of  all. 
Our  intellect  may  perceive  the  truth,  but  the  emotions  are  the  home  of 
prejudice. 


1 68  English  Literature. 

gestus,  and  Cloantlms,  are  all  of  them  Men  of  the  same  Stamp  and  Char- 
acter. 

****** 
"  If  we  look  into  the  Characters  of  Milton,  we  shall  find  that  he  has  in- 
troduced all  the  Variety  his  Fable  was  capable  of  receiving.  The  whole 
Species  of  Mankind  was  in  two  Persons  at  the  Time  to  which  the  Subject 
of  his  Poem  is  confined.  We  have,  however,  four  distinct  Characters  in 
these  two  Persons.  We  see  Man  and  Woman  in  the  highest  Innocence 
and  Perfection,  and  in  the  most  abject  State  of  Guilt  and  Infirmity.  The 
two  last  Characters  are,  indeed,  very  common  and  obvious,  but  the  two 
first  are  not  only  more  magnificent,  but  more  new  than  any  Characters 
either  in  Virgil  or  Homer,  or  indeed  in  the  whole  Circle  of  Nature." 

Even  when  Addison  so  far  rises  above  the  taste  of  his 
age  as  to  praise  the  old  ballads,  he  wears  the  fetters  of 
conventional  criticism  : 

S2xctato7\  No.  '70 :  "I  know  nothing  which  more  shews  the  essential 
and  inherent  Perfection  of  Simplicity  of  Thought,  above  that  which  I  call 
the  Gothick  Manner  in  Writing,  than  this,  that  the  first  pleases  all  kinds  of 
Palates,  and  the  latter  only  such  as  have  formed  to  themselves  a  wrong 
artificial  Taste  upon  little  fanciful  Authors  and  Writers  of  Epigram.  Homer, 
Virgil,  or  Milton,  so  far  as  the  Language  of  their  poems  is  understood,  will 
please  a  Reader  of  plain  common  Sense,  who  would  neither  relish  nor 
comprehend  an  Epigram  of  Martial,  or  a  Poem  of  Cowley :  So,  on  the  con- 
trary, an  ordinary  Song  or  Ballad  that  is  the  Delight  of  the  common  Peo- 
ple, cannot  fail  to  please  all  such  Readers  as  are  not  unqualified  for  the 
Entertainment  by  their  Affectation  or  Ignorance;  and  the  Reason  is  plain, 
because  the  same  Paintings  of  Nature  which  recommend  it  to  the  most  or- 
dinary Reader,  will  appear  Beautiful  to  the  most  refined. 

"  The  old  Song  of  '  Chevey  Chase '  is  the  favorite  Ballad  of  the  common 
People  of  England ;  and  Ben  Johnson  used  to  say  he  had  rather  have  been 
the  Author  of  it  than  of  all  his  Works." 

Then  Addison  quotes  what  Sir  Philii)  Sidney  said  about 
it  in  his  "  Defence  of  Poesy,"  and  goes  on  : 

"  The  greatest  Modern  Criticks  have  laid  it  down  as  a  Rule,  that  an  He- 
roick  Poem  should  be  founded  upon  some  important  Precept  of  Morality, 
adapted  to  the  Constitution  of  the  Country  in  which  the  Poet  writes. 
Homer  and  Virgil  have  formed  their  plans  in  this  view." 

****** 


English  Literature.  169 

"Earl  Piercy's  Lamentation  over  his  Enemy  is  generous,  beautiful,  and 
passionate ;  I  must  only  caution  the  Reader  not  to  let  the  Simplicity  of 
tlie  Stile,  which  one  may  well  pardon  in  so  old  a  Poet,  prejudice  him  against 
the  Greatness  of  the  Thought. 

'  Then  leaving  Life,  Earl  Piercy  took 
The  dead  Man  by  the  Hand, 
And  said,  Earl  Douglas,  for  thy  Life 

Would  I  had  lost  my  Land. 
'  0  Christ !  my  very  heart  doth  bleed 

With  Sorrow  for  thy  Sake ; 
For  sure  a  more  renowneil  knight 
Mischance  did  never  take.' 

That  beautiful  Line,  Taking  the  dead  Man  by  the  Hand,  will  put  the 
Reader  in  mind  of  ^Eneas's  Behaviour  towards  Lausus,  whom  he  himself 
had  slain  as  he  came  to  the  Rescue  of  his  aged  Father." 

Spectator,  No.  74 :  "  If  this  Song  had  been  written  in  the  Gothic  Man- 
ner^  which  is  the  Delight  of  all  our  little  Wits,  whether  Writers  or  Read- 
ers, it  would  not  have  hit  the  taste  of  so  many  Ages,  and  have  pleased  the 
Readers  of  all  Ranks  and  Conditions.  I  shall  only  beg  Pardon  for  such  a 
Profusion  of  Latin  Quotations ;  which  I  should  not  have  made  use  of,  but 
that  I  feared  my  own  Judgment  would  have  looked  too  singular  on  such 
a  Subject,  had  not  I  supported  it  by  the  Practice  and  Authority  of  Virgil." 

No.  85  :  "I  cannot  for  my  Heart  leave  a  Room,  before  I  have  thoroughly 
studied  the  Walls  of  it,  and  examined  the  several  printed  Papers  which  are 
usually  pasted  upon  them.  The  last  Piece  that  I  met  with  upon  this  Occa- 
sion gave  me  a  most  exquisite  Pleasure.  My  Reader  will  think  I  am  not 
serious,  when  I  acquaint  him  that  the  Piece  I  am  going  to  speak  of  was 
the  old  Ballad  of  the  Two  Children  in  the  Wood,  which  is  one  of  the 
darling  Songs  of  the  common  People,  and  has  been  the  Delight  of  most 
Englishmen  in  some  Part  of  their  Age. 

"  This  Song  is  a  plain  simple  Copy  of  Nature,  destitute  of  the  Helps  and 
Ornaments  of  Art.  The  Tale  of  it  is  a  pretty  Tragical  Story,  and  pleases 
for  no  other  Reason  but  because  it  is  a  Copy  of  Nature.  There  is  even  a 
despicable  Simplicity  in  the  Verse  ;  and  yet  because  the  Sentiments  appear 
genuine  and  unaffected,  they  are  able  to  move  the  Mind  of  the  most  polite 
Reader  with  Inward  Meltings  of  Humanity  and  Compassion.  The  Inci- 
dents grow  out  of  the  Subject,  and  are  such  as  are  the  most  proper  to  ex- 
cite Pity ;  for  which  Reason  the  whole  Narration  has  something  in  it  very 

S 


I/O  English  Literature. 

moving,  notwithstanding  the  Author  of  it  (whoever  he  was)  has  dcHver'd 
it  in  such  an  abject  Phrase  and  Poorness  of  Expression,  that  the  quoting 
any  part  of  it  would  look  like  a  Design  of  turning  it  into  Ridicule.  But 
though  the  Language  is  mean,  the  Thoughts,  (as  I  have  before  said,)  frona 
one  end  to  the  other  are  natural,  and  therefore  cannot  fail  to  please  those 
who  are  not  Judges  of  Language,  or  those  who,  notwithstanding  they  are 
Judges  of  Language,  have  a  true  and  unprejudiced  Taste  of  Nature.  The 
Condition,  Speech,  and  Behaviour  of  the  dying  Parents,  with  the  Age,  In- 
nocence, and  Distress  of  the  Children,  are  set  forth  in  such  tender  Circum- 
stances, that  it  is  impossible  for  a  Reader  of  common  Humanity  not  to  be 
affected  with  them.  As  for  the  Circumstance  of  the  Robin-red-breast,  it 
is  indeed  a  little  poetical  Ornament ;  and  to  show  the  Genius  of  the  Au- 
thor amidst  all  his  Simplicity,  it  is  just  the  same  kind  of  Fiction  which 
one  of  the  Greatest  of  the  Latin  Poets  has  made  use  of  upon  a  parallel 
Occasion ;  I  mean  that  Passage  in  Horace,  where  he  describes  himself 
when  he  was  a  Child,  fallen  asleep  in  a  desart  Wood,  and  covered  with 
Leaves  by  the  Turtles  that  took  pity  on  him."  * 

*  To  judge  what  was  thought  of  this  appeal  in  behalf  of  simplicity.  One 
may  read  what  was  said  by  Dr.  Johnson,  in  his  "  Life  of  Addison :"  "  He 
descended  now  and  then  to  lower  disquisitions ;  and  by  a  serious  display 
of  the  beauties  of  'Chevy  Chase'  exposed  himself  ...  to  the  contempt 
of  Dennis,  who,  considering  the  fundamental  position  of  his  criticism,  that 
'  Chevy  Chase '  pleases,  and  ought  to  please,  because  it  is  natural,  observes 
*  that  there  is  a  way  of  deviating  from  nature  by  bombast  and  tumour, 
which  soars  above  nature  and  enlarges  images  be3'ond  their  real  bulk;  by 
affectation  which  forsakes  nature  in  quest  of  something  unsuitable ;  and 
by  imbecility,  which  degrades  nature  by  faintness  and  diminution,  by  ob- 
scuring its  appearances  and  weakening  its  effects.'  In  'Chevy  Chase' 
there  is  not  much  of  either  bombast  or  affectation  ;  but  there  is  chill  and 
lifeless  imbecility.  The  story  cannot  possibly  be  told  in  a  way  that  shall 
make  less  impression  on  the  mind." 

Godwin,  in  his  "Enquirer"  (1797),  p.  353,  showed  that  even  he  could 
be  conservative  on  occasion  ;  he  speaks  of  Addison's  "  far-famed  and  ri- 
diculous commentary  upon  the  ballad  of  '  Chevy  Chase.'  " 

This  was  not  the  only  time  that  he  frowned  on  the  new  literature  (p. 
820) :  "  If  we  compare  the  style  of  Milton  to  that  of  later  writers,  and  par- 
ticularly to  that  of  our  own  days,  undoubtedly  nothing  but  a  very  corrupt 
taste  can  commend  it." 

Again,  p.  339 :  "  The  age  of  Charles  II.  is  regarded  by  modern  critics  with 


English  Literatare.  171 

The  papers  about  Milton  were  naturally  much  admired 
at  the  time  ;  they  came  out  on  Saturdays,  and  so  furnished 
Sunday  reading  of  an  agreeable  kind.  In  Germany,  how- 
ever, their  influence  was  greater  than  at  home.  Up  to  this 
time  German  literature  was  something  unknown  ;  yet,  in 
its  own  way,  Germany  was  going  through  the  motions  of 
having  a  literature  with  the  same  conscientiousness  that 
our  fellow  -  countrymen  showed  when  every  man  who 
wrote  was  an  American  Pope,  or  an  American  Byron,  or 
what  not.  Gottsched,  a  great  man  in  the  last  century 
(1700-66),  has  been  much  laughed  at  in  this.  lie  was  a 
cz'itic  who,  in  his  day,  did  good  service  to  letters,  but 
who  is  principally  known  to  us  now  for  having  been  a 
steadfast  supporter  of  French  influence  in  Germany,  and 
as  an  opponent  of  Bodmer  (1698-1783),  of  Zurich,  who 
was  the  head  of  what  Avas  called  the  Swiss  school.  For 
many  years  the  literary  warfare  between  these  two  men 
raged  furiously,  until  finally  real  literatm-e  appeared,  when 
their  discussions  faded  into  obscurity.  Yet  they  were  by 
no  means  fruitless.  The  two  schools  agreed  that  poetry 
consisted  in  imitating  nature,  but  the  Leipsic  school  said 
that  the  way  to  do  this  was  by  follo^nng  the  dictates 
of  reason,  and  they  hence  praised  the  French  :  the  Swiss, 
on  the  other  hand,  affirmed  that  the  reason  had  nothing  to 
do  with  it  ;  that  the  jioet  must  possess  a  creative  power, 

neglect  and  scorn  ;  though  perhaps  no  age,  except  that  of  George  III.,  was 
ever  so  auspicious  to  the  improvement  of  English  prose ;  [so  far  he  com- 
mands assent]  as  none  certainly  has  been  adorned  with  higher  flights  of 
poetry." 

After  all,  the  literary  conservatism  of  such  men  as  Voltaire  and  God- 
win admits  of  simple  explanation.  Reason,  which  made  them  intolerant 
of  the  errors  of  mankind,  and  inclined  them  to  become  political  reformers, 
also  made  them  intolerant  of  the  misty,  emotional  side  of  the  new  Ro- 
manticism.    They  demanded,  above  everything,  clearness. 


172  English  Literature. 

whicli  they  called  Phantasie,  or  the  imagination  ;  that 
what  was  wonderful  was  not  only  a  means,  but  also  the 
end  and  object  of  poetry  ;  and  they  praised  Milton  and  the 
Greeks,  recommending  that  they  be  studied.  Both  parties 
agreed  that  poetry  must  be  useful,  instructive,  didactic. 
The  Swiss  urged  the  study  of  the  poets  they  praised  ; 
Gottsched  recommended  the  imitation  of  those  he  admired. 
The  quarrel  then  went  on,  Gottsched  decrying  Milton, 
and  Bodmer,  who  translated  these  essays  in  the  Spectator, 
praising  him.  In  time  Gottsched  was  driven  from  the 
field,  and,  although  Bodmer  was  not  a  man  who  was  able 
to  lead,  he  at  least  deserves  credit  for  pointing  out  the 
path  which  Germany  was  to  follow.  Gottsched's  plan 
was  to  let  France  be  for  Germany  what  Greece  was  for 
Rome,  and  he  worked  eagerly  in  support  of  this  nocion  ; 
but  he  succumbed,  not  before  Bodmer,  but  before  the  cur- 
rent of  the  time.  Bodmer's  notion  was  that  the  imagi- 
nation should  be  the  slave  of  utility,  and  that  the  way  of 
accomplishing  this  was  by  the  fable  ;  this  is  bringing  up 
at  the  starting-point  with  a  vengeance.* 

But  outside  of  all  this  there  lay  on  Gottsched's  side,  as 
was  to  be  expected,  contempt  for  Homer  in  comparison 
with  Vergil,  and  exaggerated  praise  of  Horace,  Boileau, 
the  French  tragedians,  and  French  literature.     Bodmer, 


*  The  deliljerate  way  in  which  fables  were  reached  is  expounded  by 
Goethe.  Ut  piduj-a,  poesis,  was  affirmed,  and  the  poet  began  with  com- 
parisons and  descriptions.  But  the  imitation  of  nature  demands  choice, 
and  so  lie  chose  what  was  most  striking ;  this  was  what  was  most  new, 
and  finally  what  was  wonderful.  It  was  necessary  that  his  work  should 
have  some  improving  influence  on  mankind,  and,  as  there  was  nothing 
more  wonderful  than  talking  beasts,  fables  were  selected  as  a  favorite 
method  of  conveying  instruction ;  they  coml)ined  nature,  wonder,  and 
utility.  This  all  sounds,  however,  a  good  deal  like  an  excuse  for  the  fable, 
which  was  sufficiently  attractive  from  its  unfailing  moral.  Vide  Goethe, 
"  Dichtung  und  Wahrheit,"  i.  6.  . 


English  Literature.  173 

and  his  ally  Breilinger,  on  the  other  hand,  were  never 
tired  of  praising  Homer,  Ariosto,  Tasso,  Milton,  and  Sas- 
par,  as  they  called  Shakspere.  This  was  the  side  that 
triumphed,  and  when  finally  Germany  began  to  count  in 
literature  it  was  under  the  inspiration  of  England  rather 
than  of  France  that  her  authors  began  to  write  ;  the  main 
importance  of  Lessing,  who  derived  much  from  England, 
as  a  critic  was  that  he  hopelessly  expelled  the  imitation 
of  classic  French  writers  from  Germany.  Towards  the 
end  of  the  last  century  Germany  repaid  its  debt  with  ac- 
cumulated interest,  by  carrying  out  the  theories  of  the  best 
English  writers,  by  seeing  and  preaching  the  superiority 
of  those  who  did  not  follow  French  models  and  by  join- 
ing with  them  in  the  study  of  the  long-neglected  past. 
Later  we  shall  come  to  see  the  influence  which  Burger 
and  Goethe,  etc.,  had  on  Scott  and  Coleridge.  Then  we 
shall  perceive  more  clearly  that,  when  Addison  was  prov- 
ing how  good  the  "  Paradise  Lost "  was,  with  an  air  as 
if  he  were  dancing  the  minuet,  he  was  really  aiding  the 
work  of  the  writers  who,  a  century  later,  were  abolishing 
all  the  traces  of  the  school  to  which  Addison  belonged 
when  he  wrote  formally.  The  discord  between  Gottsched 
and  Bodmer  seems,  in  some  respects,  like  a  tempest  in  a 
teapot  ;  but  it  was  really  the  foreboding  of  a  great  rev- 
olution. Bodmer  tried  to  compress  the  whole  inspiration 
of  "Paradise  Lost"  within  the  six  lines  of  a  fable  and 
its  twenty  lines  of  moral,  but,  naturally  enough,  he  failed 
in  this  attempt  to  bottle  the  ocean. 

So  long  as  we  bear  in  mind  that  these  crude  discussions 
were  the  beginning  of  a  momentous  reform  in  literature, 
they  acquire  an  importance  which  otherwise  we  should 
be  only  too  ready  to  deny  them.  They  were  not  a  mere 
interchange  of  prejudices,  they  were  the  first  dim  grop- 
ings  after  better  things.     We  must  remember  that  scarcely 


1 74  English  Literature. 

anything  is  ludicrous  in  itself  except  any  person's  belief 
that  in  him  alone  does  wisdom  reside.  What  was  most 
strongly  impressed  upon  these  German  writers,  as,  indeed, 
upon  Addison  himself,  was  the  great  need  of  rudimentary 
education,  and  the  desirability  of  finding  rules  which 
might  be  of  universal  application  ;  and  since  they  made 
these  out  of  the  remarks  of  critics  rather  than  out  of  the 
study  of  original  writers,  they  very  soon  fell  into  confu- 
sion. At  all  times,  indeed,  the  didactic  critic  is  in  danger 
of  being  left  behind  by  the  intellectual  movements  of  his 
time.  The  critics  stand  up  for  precedent,  and  creative 
writers  try  to  improve  on  precedent.  This,  however, 
leads  us  far  away  from  Addison  and  his  solemn  remarks 
on  Milton. 

We  have  seen  how,  when  he  was  most  formal,  and  was 
defining  the  epic  by  the  rules  of  Aristotle,  he  was  uncon- 
sciously paving  the  way  for  another  method  of  thinking 
and  writing.  In  those  papers  about  Sir  Roger  de  Cover- 
ley  he  was,  to  a  considerable  extent,  laying  the  foundations 
of  the  English  novel.  At  that  time  fiction  was  in  an  un- 
promising condition.  In  No.  37  of  the  Spectator  we  find 
a  list  of  books  which  a  lady  had  collected,  and  it  is  inter- 
esting to  make  use  of  this  glimpse  which  Addison  gives 
us  of  the  life  of  the  time.  Of  novels,  we  find  here  "  Cas- 
sandra," "  Cleopatra,"  "  Astraea,"  "  The  Grand  Cyrus," 
*'  Pembroke's  Arcadia,"  a  volume  mysteriously  referred 
to  as  "  a  book  of  novels,"  "  Clelia,"  Mrs.  Mauley's  "  The 
New  Atalantis,"  a  book  which  no  lady  would  have  in 
her  library  now,  and  Steele's  "Christian  Hero"  —  for 
the  most  part,  books  which  no  one  would  read  now  ex- 
cept from  a  sense  of  duty.  At  this '  time,  Richardson 
(1689-1761)  was  still  in  a  printing-oftice,  Fielding  (1707- 
54)  a  child,  and  Smollett  (1721-71)  not  yet  born.  In 
other  w^ords,  what  we   know  as   the   English  novel   did 


English  Literature.  175 

not  exist.  It  would  be  too  much  to  say  that  Addison 
founded  it  by  his  little  sketches  in  the  Spectator.  To 
give  him  all  the  credit  for  it  would  be  unfair.  Other 
causes  contributed,  which  I  shall  sj)eak  of  in  a  moment, 
but  Addison  helped  it  in  two  ways  :  first,  by  drawing 
those  many  little  scenes  of  real  life  which  keep  the  AS);ec- 
tator  ever  fresh  before  us  ;  and,  secondly,  by  aiding  the 
general  uplifting  of  the  bourgeoisie  into  prominence.  As 
we  have  seen,  it  was  imagined  that  nothing  but  kings  and 
very  high  nobles  were  deserving  of  a  writer's  attention,  in 
the  time  of  the  tales  of  chivalry  and  the  heroic  drama. 
When  the  comic  writers  began  to  write  about  citizens,  it 
was  with  the  object  of  holding  them  ujd  to  the  scorn  of 
the  nobility.  The  women  were  represented  as  vicious, 
and  the  men  as  ridiculous.  They  were  looked  upon  as 
fair  game  for  the  wits.  As  in  time  the  political  power  of 
the  citizens  made  itself  felt,  they  began  to  be  esteemed  tit 
subjects  for  tiction.  So  long  as  the  only  persons  Avho  are 
prominent  are  lords,  dukes,  and  earls,  they  will  be  the  only 
persons  who  are  reflected  in  what  we  may  call  recognized 
literature.  We  must  remember  that  underneath  the  stra- 
tum of  literature  with  which  we  are  supposed  to  be  fa- 
miliar as  a  part  of  our  education,  there  are  the  chap-books, 
the  ballads,  the  stories  which  in  their  time  have  delighted 
the  populace,  and  which  were  only  frowned  upon  by  those 
eminent  persons  who  deigned  to  give  them  any  attention. 
These  writings  show  the  directions  of  popular  taste — not, 
I  trust,  its  amount. 

When  Addison  drew  such  scenes  as  Sir  Roger  at  the 
theatre — 

Spectator,  No.  335 :  "  We  convoy'd  him  in  safety  to  the  Play-house, 
where,  after  having  marched  up  the  Entry  in  good  order,  the  Captain  and 
I  went  in  with  him,  and  seated  him  betwixt  us  in  the  Pit.  As  soon  as  the 
House  was  full,  and  the  Candles   lighted,  my  old  Friend  stood  up  and 


1/6  iLmjUisli  Literature. 

looked  about  hiiu  with  that  Pleasure,  which  a  Mind  seasoned  with  Hu- 
manity naturally  feels  in  itself,  at  the  Sight  of  a  Multitude  of  People  who 
seem  pleased  with  one  another,  and  partake  of  the  same  common  Enter- 
tainment. I  could  not  but  fancy  to  myself,  as  the  old  Man  stood  up  in 
the  Middle  of  the  Pit,  that  he  made  a  very  proper  Center  to  a  Tragiek 
Audience.  Upon  the  entring  of  Pyrrhus,  the  Knight  told  me,  that  he 
did  not  believe  the  King  of  France  himself  had  a  better  Strut.  I  was 
indeed  very  attentive  to  my  old  Friend's  Remarks,  because  I  looked  upon 
them  as  a  Piece  of  natural  Criticism,  and  was  well  pleased  to  hear  him 
at  the  Conclusion  of  almost  evei'y  Scene,  telling  me  that  he  could  not 
imagine  how  the  Play  would  end.  The  while  he  appeared  much  concerned 
for  Andromache ;  and  a  little  while  after  as  much  for  Hermione ;  and  was 
extremely  puzzled  to  think  what  would  become  of  Pyrrhus. 

"  When  Sir  Roger  saw  Andromache's  obstinate  Refusal  to  her  Lover's 
Importunities,  he  whisper'd  me  in  the  Ear,  that  he  was  sure  she  would 
never  have  him ;  to  which  he  added,  with  a  more  than  ordinary  Vehe- 
mence, You  can't  imagine.  Sir,  what  'tis  to  have  to  do  with  a  Widow.  Upon 
Pyrrhus  his  threatning  afterwards  to  leave  her,  the  Knight  shook  his 
Head,  and  muttered  to  himself.  Ay,  do  if  you  can.  This  Part  dwelt  so 
much  upon  my  Friend's  Imagination,  that  at  the  close  of  the  Third  Act, 
as .  I  was  thinking  of  something  else,  he  whispered  in  my  Ear,  These 
Widows,  Sir,  are  the  most  perverse  Creatures  in  the  World.  But  pray, 
says  he,  you  that  are  a  Critick,  is  this  Play  according  to  your  Dramatick 
Rules,  as  you  call  them  ?  Should  your  People  in  Tragedy  always  talk  to 
be  understood  ?  Why,  there  is  not  a  single  Sentence  in  this  Play  that  I 
do  not  know  the  Meaning  of. 

"  The  Fourth  Act  very  luckily  begun  before  I  had  time  to  give  the  old 
Gentleman  an  Answer :  Well,  says  the  Knight,  sitting  down  with  great 
Satisfaction,  I  suppose  we  are  now  to  see  Hector's  Ghost.  He  then  re- 
newed his  Attention,  and,  from  time  to  time,  fell  a  praising  the  Widow. 
He  made,  indeed,  a  little  Mistake  as  to  one  of  her  Pages,  whom  at  his  first 
entering,  he  took  for  Astyanax;  but  he  quickly  set  himself  right  in  that 
Particular,  though,  at  the  same  time,  he  owned  he  should  have  been  very 
glad  to  have  seen  the  little  Boy,  who,  says  he,  must  needs  be  a  very  fine 
Child  by  the  Account  that  is  given  of  him.  Upon  Hermione's  going  off 
with  a  Menace  to  Pyrrhus,  the  Audience  gave  a  loud  Clap ;  to  wdiich  Sir 
Roger  added,  On  my  Word,  a  notable  young  Baggage  ! 

"  As  there  was  a  very  remarkable  Silence  and  Stillness  in  the  Audience 
durinf  the  whole  Action,  it  was  natural  for  them  to  take  the  Opportunity 
of  these  Intervals  between  the  Acts,  to  Express  their  Opinion  of  the  Play- 


English  Literature.  lyj 

ers,  and  of  their  respective  Parts.  Sir  Koger  hearing  a  Cluster  of  them 
praise  Orestes,  strucli  in  with  them,  and  told  them,  that  he  thought  bis 
Friend  Pylades  was  a  very  sensible  Man ;  as  they  were  afterwards  applaud- 
ing Pyrrhus,  Sir  Roger  put  in  a  second  time  ;  And  let  me  tell  you,  says  he, 
though  he  speaks  but  little,  I  like  the  old  Fellow  in  Whiskers,  as  well  as 
any  of  them.  Captain  Sentry  seeing  two  or  three  Waggs  who  sat  near  us, 
lean  with  an  attentive  Ear  towards  Sir  Roger,  and  fearing  lest  they  should 
Smoke  the  Knight,  pluck'd  him  by  the  Elbow,  and  whisper'd  something  in 
his  Ear,  that  lasted  till  the  Opening  of  the  Fifth  Act.  The  Knight  was 
wonderfully  attentive  to  the  Account  which  Orestes  gave  of  Pyrrhus  his 
Death,  and  at  the  Conclusion  of  it,  told  me  it  was  such  a  bloody  Piece  of 
Work,  thao  he  was  glad  it  was  not  done  upon  the  Stage.  Seeing  after- 
wards Orestes  in  his  raving  Fit,  he  grew  more  than  ordinary  serious,  and 
took  occasion  to  moralize  (in  his  way)  upon  an  Evil  Conscience,  adding, 
that  Orestes,  in  his  Madness,  looked  as  if  he  saw  something." 

— When,  I  say,  he  drew  such  scenes  as  this,  lie  was  uncon- 
sciously setting  a  model  for  future  novelists.  I  do  not 
mean  that  he  deliberately  chose  one  of  a  dozen  different 
ways  of  describing  the  scene,  and  that  later  writers,  seeing 
his  success,  determined  to  write  in  the  same  way  ;  but, 
rather,  that  he  wrote  in  the  manner  that  was  natural  to 
him,  and  that  this  was  the  English  way  when  unaffected 
by  the  deliberate  copying  of  other  people.  So  far  as  it  is 
safe  or  possible  to  distinguish  the  distinctive  characteris- 
tics of  the  different  countries  of  Europe,  one  of  the  main 
qualities  of  English  literature  is  this  semi  -  humorous  ob- 
servation—  we  find  it  in  Chaucer,  Shakspere,  Addison, 
Fielding,  Thackeray,  Dickens,  Scott,  Sterne,  Jane  Austen, 
and  in  the  first  novel  of  the  "  Franklin  Square  Library  " 
on  which  our  hand  happens  to  fall.  We  are  so  accustomed 
to  it,  that  we  do  not  fairly  notice  it  until  we  have  been 
occupying  ourselves  with  something  else,  just  as  we  do 
not  observe  the  freshness  of  the  open  air  until  we  come 
out  into  it  from  a  close  room.  We  are  struck  by  it,  as  we 
are  struck  by  a  certain  logical  coherence  and  sense  of  form 
in  the  French  ;  by  the  poetical  flavor  of  the  imaginative 

8* 


1 78  English  Literature. 

writings  of  the  Germans,  and  by  the  tremendous  passion 
whicli  the  Russian  writers  are  bringing  into  literature. 
These  are  faint  and  crude  generalizations,  to  be  sure,  like 
our  notions  of  a  German  with  a  I'o'und  face,  blue  eyes,  and 
light  hair ;  or  a  sallow  Frenchman  ;  or  a  red-cheeked 
Englishman — but  we  are  surprised,  and  justly  surprised, 
when  we  make  a  mistake  in  a  foreigner's  nationality. 
When  we  come  to  speak  of  Defoe  we  shall  make  further 
investigations  into  the  paternity  of  the  English  novel  ; 
here  we  must  confine  ourselves  to  the  discussion  of  Addi- 
son's contribution  to  this  wonderful  result,  which  we  have 
before  us  in  the  Spectator.  And  this  includes,  besides  the 
practical  work  we  see  in  the  sketches  of  Sir  Roger  de 
Coverley  and  his  friends,  the  attention  he  has  given  to  the 
life  he  saw  about  him.  One  of  the  most  important  things, 
indeed,  for  a  writer  to  do  is  to  speak  of  what  he  knows, 
and  he  is  pretty  sure  to  know  best  what  he  has  himself 
seen.  Addison  aided  this  movement  in  every  way  in  his 
power.  He  wrote  about  life  as  he  saw  it,  and  his  *-%)ec- 
tator  is  a  classic  work,  lie  succeeded,  too,  without  very 
definitely  knowing  what  he  was  doing.  He  was  not  try- 
ing to  be  a  realist ;  he  aimed  at  improving  the  minds  and 
tastes  of  his  contemporaries,  and  to  get  a  hearing  he  made 
himself  simple  ;  he  showed  them  what  they  were,  how 
they  acted  in  society,  what  their  foibles  were,  and  put  his 
little  word  of  advice  in  here  and  there,  where  its  influence 
would  be  felt  before  the  reader  knew  that  he  was  swallow- 
ing moral  medicine. 

That  the  influence  of  the  Spectator  was  great  we  learn 
from  a  number  of  contemporary  sources.  Tickell  said  of 
it  (preface  to  his  edition  of  Addison) :  "  The  world  be- 
came insensibly  reconciled  to  wisdom  and  goodness,  when 
they  saw  them  recommended  by  him  with  at  least  as  much 
Bpirit  and  elegance,  as  they  had  been  ridiculed  for  half  a 


Eiujl'islx  Literature.  i8i 

the  translations  of  the  Spectator  itself  into  those  different 
tongues.  Indeed,  nothing  like  its  popularity  had  been 
known  before  in  English  literature,  and  the  only  thing 
which  can  be  compared  with  it  is  the  wonderful  success 
of  the  "  Waverley  Novels."  What  it  did  in  England  in 
establishing  a  form  of  literature  which  is  barely  extinct 
yet,  we  shall  soon  see.  Dec.  6,  1712,  it  ceased  to  appear, 
although  it  was  resumed  June  18,  1714,  appearing  thrice 
a  week  till  Dec.  20  of  the  same  year,  when  it  finally  closed. 
It  was  speedily  followed  by  the  Guardian,  which  ap- 
peared, in  fact,  before  the  eighth  volume  of  the  Spectator, 
under  the  direction  of  Steele,  who  determined  "to  have 
nothing  to  manage  with  any  person  or  party  ;"  but  Steele 
was  a  philosopher  by  fits  and  starts,  and  political  feeling 
ran  so  high  that  he  soon  gave  up  that  paper  and  took 
up  the  Englishman,  in  which  his  fervor  had  full  swing 
in  attacking  Swift's  Examiner.  The  first  volume  of  the 
Guardian  contains  many  good  essays  by  Berkeley,  Pope, 
and  Tickell,  and  the  second  many  by  Addison. 

In  England,  the  number  of  successors  of  the  Spectator 
was  very  great,  although  now  the  very  names  of  most  are 
forgotten.  The  Censor,  the  Hermit,  the  Surprize,  the  Si- 
lent 31onitor,  the  Inquisitor,  the  Pilgrim,  the  Restorer,  the 
Instructor,  the  Grumbler,  the  Freethinker,  the  Anti-theatre, 
the  Weaver,  etc.  Even  the  names  of  those  for  which  Ad- 
dison %|pd  Steele  wrote  are  known  only  to  scholars,  and 
very  properly,  for  these  are  but  the  fringes  of  scholarship  ; 
the  main  thing  is  to  understand  what  the  Essay  was,  and 
what  part  it  has  played  in  English  literature.  Therefore 
we  shall  not  take  up  the  essays  at  any  length  until  we 
come  to  Dr.  Johnson's  Rambler^  that  does  stand  out  above 
the  general  crowd.  And  since  numbers  are  sometimes  of 
use  in  conveying  information,  I  will  add  that  between 
1709  and  1809  there  were  two  hundred  and  fourteen  pub- 


1 82  English  Literature, 

lications  of  the  sort  we  have  been  discussing  ;  one  hundred 
and  six  between  the  Tatler  and  the  Rambler,  forty-one 
years  ;  and  between  the  Rambler  and  1809  just  the  same 
number  ;  in  the  fifty-nine  years  since  then  they  have  ceased. 
Yet  the  fame  and  the  influence  of  the  Spectator  survive. 
These  light  papers,  which  Addison  wrote  with  doubtless 
but  little  understanding  of  their  value,  now  belong  to  the 
English  classics,  while  what  he  regarded  as  his  most  im- 
portant contribution  to  literature,  his  "  Cato,"  lives  only 
in  a  few  quotations,  and  is  mentioned  now  principally  as 
one  of  the  few  specimens  in  English  literature  of  a  play 
written  according  to  the  rules.  To  be  sure,  these  rules 
had  but  little  direct  influence  on  English  literature,  but 
no  one  can  understand  the  character  of  the  drama  of  that 
nation  without  knowing  what  it  was  not,  and  in  what 
ways  it  differed  from  that  of  other  countries. 


English  Literature.  183 


CHAPTER  V. 

We  know  that  it  was  flung  in  the  face  of  the  English 
dramatists  that  they  did  not  regard  the  rules,  which  for 
three  hundred  years  were  spoken  of  in  Europe  with  as 
much  reverence  as  the  Ten  Commandments,  and  were 
obeyed  with  incomparably  more  zeal.  It  may  be  worth 
while,  then,  to  take  "  Cato  "  for  our  excuse,  and  under  the 
shield  of  his  good  name  to  examine  these  rules,  and  see 
what  it  was  that  moulded  the  drama  of  parts  of  continen- 
tal Europe  from  the  revival  of  letters  down  to  a  time 
within  the  memory  of  men  still  living.  To  do  this  it  is 
not  necessary  to  go  into  the  history  of  the  miracle-plays 
and  mysteries  which  abounded  in  the  Middle  Ages,  under 
slightly  varying  forms,  in  Italy,  France,  Spain,  England, 
and  Germany  ;  we  may  turn  at  once  to  the  early  attempts 
to  revive  the  drama  at  the  time  of  the  Renaissance,  for  all 
testimony  seems  to  show  that  the  drama  revived  as  a  whol- 
ly independent  thing  amid  the  general  resuscitation  of 
literary  interests.  Indeed,  the  fact  that  then  plays  were 
first  written  more  with  a  desire  to  have  a  full  showing  in 
the  various  departments  of  intellectual  work  than  from  an 
intense  feeling  seeking  dramatic  expression — just  as  some 
people  buy  the  books  which  they  think  they  ought  to  care 
for,  and  not  the  books  they  Avant  —  this  fact,  I  say,  poi- 
soned the  stream  at  its  fountain-head. 

I  quote  from  Mr.  Symonds's  "  Renaissance  in  Italy " 


184  }Liujlii<h  L'dtratare. 

some  interesting  and  acute  remarks  on  the  conditions 
necessary  for  the  full  and  natural  development  of  the 
drama.  He  says  :  "Three  conditions,  enjoyed  by  Greece 
and  England,  but  denied  to  Italy,  seem  necessary  for  the 
poetry  of  a  nation  to  reach  this  final  stage  of  artistic 
development.  The  first  is  a  free  and  sympathetic  pub- 
lic, not  made  up  of  courtiers  and  scholars,  but  of  men  of 
all  classes — a  public  representative  of  the  whole  nation, 
with  whom  the  playwright  shall  feel  himself  in  close  rap- 
port. The  second  is  a  centre  of  social  life — an  Athens, 
Paris,  or  London — where  the  heart  of  the  nation  beats  and 
where  its  brain  is  ever  active.  The  third  is  the  perturba- 
tion of  the  race  in  some  great  effort,  like  the  Persian  war, 
or  the  sti'uggle  of  the  Reformation,  which  unites  the  peo- 
ple in  a  common  consciousness  of  heroism.  Taken  in  com- 
bination, these  three  conditions  explain  the  appearance  of 
a  drama  fitted  to  express  the  very  life  and  soul  of  a  puis- 
sant nation,  with  the  temper  of  the  times  impressed  upon 
it,  but  with  a  truth  and  breadth  that  renders  it  the  heri- 
tage of  every  race  and  age.  A  national  drama  is  the 
image  created  for  itself  in  art  by  a  people  which  has  ar- 
rived at  knowledge  of  its  power,  at  the  enjoyment  of  its 
faculties,  after  a  period  of  successful  action.  Concen- 
trated in  a  capital,  gifted  with  a  common  instrument  of 
self-expression,  it  projects  itself  in  tragedies  and  comedies 
that  bear  the  name  of  individual  poets,  but  are,  in  reality, 
the  spirit  of  the  race  made  vocal."  * 

But  the  Italians  saw  great  tragedies  in  antiquity,  and  so 
sat  down  to  compose  great  tragedies  for  modern  times. 
Let  us  not  laugh  at  them  ;  we  see  the  same  error  about 
us,  unless,  indeed,  we  happen  to  be  committing  it  our- 
selves.   When  we  hear  or  say  that  the  "  Nibelungen  Lied  " 

*  "Renaissance  in  Italy,"  v.  112.  See  also  his  "Greek  Poets"  (Amer. 
eJ.),  ii.  1  et  seq. 


EiujI'dsJl  Literature.  185 

or  the  "Chanson  de  Roland"  is  quite  as  fine  as  the 
"  Iliad  "  and  the  "  Odyssey,"  we  are  making  our  bow  to 
antiquity,  and  attempting  to  show  that  we  are  as  good  as 
the  Greeks,  and  that  our  early  writers  are  as  good  as 
theirs.  We  are  using  old-fashioned  standards  of  meas- 
urement— or  at  least  misusing  them. 

The  fii-st  regular  Italian  tragedy  was  Trissino's  "  Sofo- 
nisba,"  which  was  finished  in  1515,  and  six  times  printed 
before  its  first  performance  in  1562.*  Trissino  was  an 
eager  advocate  of  the  improvement  of  Italian  literature, 
but  he  saw  only  one  way  of  accomplishing  his  object — i.  e., 
by  copying  the  ancients.  He  wrote  an  epic  poem,  "  Italia 
Liberata,"  in  blank  verse,  in  which  he  turned  his  back  on 
the  method  adopted  by  Ariosto  and  subsequently  followed 
by  Tasso,  and  tried  his  best  to  imitate  Homer.  This  was 
a  complete  failure  ;  but  his  "  Sof onisba,"  although  it 
really  had  no  success  on  the  stage,  did  have  an  influence 
on  dramatic  literature.  It  is  to  be  noticed  that  it  was 
printed  six  times  before  it  was  acted  :  this  statement  suf- 
fices to  show  the  difference  between  a  real  drama  and  a 
literary  drama,  just  as  now  a  certain  number  of  English 
poets  write  plays  in  book-form  and  fancy  they  are  improv- 
ing the  English  stage,  forgetting  that  fitness  for  represen- 
tation is  the  only  true  test  of  a  play,  as  readableness  is  of 
a  novel.  Certainly,  if  the  English  drama  is  to  be  revived, 
this  will  be  done  by  plays  on  the  boards,  not  by  books  on 
the  shelves. 

In   his    "  Sof  onisba,"  Trissino  f   followed   very   closely 

*  So  Mr.  Symonds.  Elsewhere  it  is  stated  that  it  was  performed  in 
1515,  but  not  i-cpeated  until  1562.  It  has  been  acted  in  Italy  within  a  few 
years. 

t  Trissino  was  not  alone  ;  Rucellai  wrote  his  "  Rosmunda  "  in  generous 
rivalry.  Symonds  ("  Renaissance  in  Italy,"  v.  236)  says :  "  These  two  dear- 
est friends,  when  they  were  together  in  a  room,  would  jump  upon  a  bench 
and  declaim  pieces  of  their  tragedies,  calling  upon  the  audience  to  dccido 


i86  English  Literature. 

what  we  took  to  be  the  practice  of  the  ancients.  I  have 
already  spoken  of  the  enormous  influence  of  Aristotle  ;  it 
was  now  about  to  aj^pear  in  a  new  quarter.  Trissino  wrote 
an  "Ars  Poetica,"  made  up  out  of  Aristotle  and  Iloi'ace, 
and  applied  these  rules  with  the  utmost  rigor  in  this  play. 
The  rules,  or  the  three  unities,  as  they  were  afterwards 
called,  were  the  unity  of  action — which  different  writers 
took  to  mean  a  number  of  different  things,  as  we  shall 
presently  see  —  unity  of  time,  which  demanded  that  the 
action  should  take  place  within  twenty-four  hours  ;  and 
unity  of  place,  which  was  taken  to  mean  that  the  scene 
should  not  be  transferred  beyond  the  palace,  temple,  or 
dwelling  where  the  action  was  supposed  to  occur.*  The 
only  one  of  these  rules  which  commanded  universal  as- 
sent was  the  unity  of  time,  for  the  unity  of.  place  was 
interpreted  in  various  ways,  sometimes  being  taken  as 
forbidding  change  of  scene  within  the  limits  of  an  act. 
All  of  these  rules  were  followed  in  their  literal  sense  by 
Trissino  in  his  "  Sof onisba,"  and  they  were  introduced 
into  France  by  Mairet,  who  wrote  a  "  Sophonisba,"  which 
was  produced  at  Rouen  in  1629.  Before  this  the  French 
plays  had  coquetted  with  the  unities,  and  many  of  them 
were  closely  modelled  on  those  of  Seneca  ;  but  the  "  So- 
])honisba,"  coming  with  all  the  authority  of  Italy  behind 
it,  firmly  established  the  rules  on  the  French  stage.     All 

between  them  on  the  merits  of  their  plays."  The  "  Rosmunda  "  was  acted 
at  about  the  same  time  with  the  "  Sofonisba."  It  is  not  now  easy  to  de- 
tect which  was  the  better.  The  "Rosmunda"  is  unmistakably  a  dull  play. 
The  author,  lest  his  characters  should  break  some  rule  by  action,  keeps 
them  apart,  declaiming  to  echo-like  confidants. 

•  Speron  Speronc,  Giraldi,  Dolce,  while  they  studied  Greek  originals,  all 
agreed  that  Seneca  had  much  improved  on  the  Greek  methods.  Their 
plays  contained  no  tragic  solemnity,  no  lyric  beauty — nothing  but  mangled 
plots  and  cold  declamation. 

*  Vide  Simpson's  "  Dramatic  Unities,"  p.  8. 


English  Literature.  187 

the  great  French  tragedies,  down  to  Victor  Hugo's  "  Crom- 
well "  and  "  Hernani,"  were  written  in  obedience  to  them. 
Even  Voltaire  was  one  of  their  warmest  defenders. 

The  history  of  the  growth  and  decay  of  the  miities  is 
full  of  interest,  as  illustrative  of  the  general  course  of 
pseudo-classicism  in  literature.  Their  value  was  one  of 
the  most  important  of  the  tenets  of  this  school,  and  it  was, 
in  France  at  least,  one  of  the  longest-lived.  As  was  just 
stated,  they  were  not  absolutely  novel  in  France  ;  when 
they  were  firmly  planted  there,  the  ground  had  been  al- 
ready prepared  for  their  reception,  Mellin  de  St.  Gelais 
had  translated  Trissino's  "  Sof onisba,"  with  the  dialogue 
in  prose  and  the  chorus  alone  in  verse,  and  this  rendering 
had  been  acted  before  Henry  II.,  at  Blois,  in  1559.  There 
had  been,  too,  other  versions  of  this  play.*  Moreover,  the 
dramatists  of  the  Pleiad,  cir.  1550,  in  their  transcripts  of 
ancient  tragedies,  had  observed  the  unities,  more,  doubt- 
less, from  imitation  than  from  deliberate  effort.  There 
were  other  dramatists  whose  influence  lay  in  the  oppo- 
site direction  ;  the  most  important  of  whom  was  Hardy 
(1560-1631),  who  wrote  six  or  eight  hundred  plays — for 
authorities  differ.  Fontenelle  says  that  this  statement 
will  cease  to  surprise  any  one  who  reads  them.  Hardy 
nobly  disregarded  the  unities  in  many  of  his  dramas,  in 
this  following  the  Spanish  rather  than  the  classic  or  the 
Italian  stage.  For,  as  Lope  de  Vega  said,  before  he 
wrote  he  locked  up  with  six  keys  the  "  Ars  Poetica,"  and 
turned  Terence  and  Plautus  out  of  his  study.f    The  medi- 

*  Vide  Ebert,  *' Entwickelungsgeschichte  der  franz.  Tragodie,"  p.  138. 
t  "  Y  quando  he  de  escribir  una  Comedia, 

Encierro  los  preceptos  con  seis  Haves ; 

Saco  a  Terencio  y  Plauto  de  mi  estudio, 

Para  que  no  me  den  voces,  que  suele 

Dar  gridos  la  verdad  en  libros  mudos." 

— Arte  de  Hacer  Comedias.     Obias  sueltas  iv.  406. 


1 88  Kiujllssh  Literature. 

ocrity  of  Hardy  threw  the  victory  into  the  hands  of  his 
antagonists,  Avho  could  bring  antiquity  and  all  the  au- 
thority of  Italy  against  his  lax  principles  and  crude 
workmanship.  Catherine  de  Medicis,  it  must  be  remem- 
bered, opened  the  court  to  the  more  refined  influences  of 
Italy,  and  dramatic  companies  from  that  country  gave  per- 
formances in  France  between  1570  and  1577. 

There  were  many  indications  of  the  impending  rule  of 
the  unities.  Mairet,  before  he  wrote  his  "  Sophonisba," 
in  the  preface  to  his  "  Silvanire "  (1625),  urged  their 
adoption  because,  he  said,  they  would  enable  the  specta- 
tor to  see  the  action  of  the  play  as  if  it  really  were  go- 
ing on  before  him,  and  hence  would  be  spared  the  trouble 
of  trying  to  make  out  how  the  actor,  speaking  at  Rome  in 
the  last  scene  of  the  first  act,  should  be  in  Athens  at  the 
beginning  of  the  next  act.  *  Segrais  says  it  was  Chape- 
lain  who  made  the  change  by  recommending  it  to  Mai- 
ret ;  f  and  doubtless  the  authority  of  Chapelain,  who  was 
a  minister,  and  of  high  repute  as  a  man  of  taste,  weighed 
for  something,  but  it  was  far  from  being  all.  In  politics 
he,  with  all  of  his  generation  who  had  received  the  new 
learning,  was  busy  in  extirpating  the  remains  of  feudal- 
ism, the  memories  of  chivalry,  the  vestiges  of  the  JNIiddle 
Ages,  and  the  romantic  drama  stood  for  all  these  things 
Avith  them,  and  they  sturdily  maintained  what  they  took 
to  be  the  modern  side.  Discipline,  which,  as  Fournier 
says  ("  Litterature  Independante,"  p.  22),  is  the  character- 

*  Vide  Bizos,  "  I^tude  sur  Mairet,"  p.  126. 

.  t  "  Ce  fut  Monsieur  Chapelain  qui  fut  cause  que  I'on  connncii^a  ^  ob- 
server la  rfegle  des  24  heures  dans  les  Pieces  de  Theatre  (et  parce  qu'il 
faloit  premierement  le  faire  agreer  aux  Comediens,  qui  imposoient  la  loi 
aux  Auteurs);  I!  [doubtless,  Chapelaiu]  communiqua  la  chose  i\  M.  Mai- 
ret, qui  fit  la  Soplionisbe,  qui  est  la  premiere  Piece  ou  cette  r^gle  est 
observee." — Ancc.  i.  101. 


Eiigl'ish  Literature.  189 

istic  quality  of  the  seventeenth  century  in  France,  con- 
quered here  as  everywhere.  No  one  man  made  the 
change  :  it  was  a  widespread  movement,  although  it 
might  have  been  seriously  modified,  if  not  thwarted,  had 
Hardy  been  a  man  of  real  genius. 

As  we  shall  see,  Corneille  could  not  withstand  the  gen- 
eral sentiment  of  his  contemporaries,  though  in  his  heart 
he  yearned  for  the  freer  treatment  and  more  coijious  ma- 
terial of  the  Spanish  stage.  The  critics  for  once  got 
matters  into  their  own  hands,  and  they  clipped  the  wings 
of  poetry,  Trissino,  Malherbe,  and  Voltaire  were  all  rather 
critics  than  poets.* 

In  order  to  know  what  the  unities  were,  let  us  see  what 
Aristotle  said  on  the  subject,  and  how  his  words  were  in- 
terpreted by  different  writers. 

Aristotle,  in  his  "  Poeticon,"  said  :  "  Tragedy  is  the  imi- 
tation of  a  grave  and  complete  action  possessing  magni- 
tude ;  (clothed)  in  pleasing  language,  independently  of  the 
(pleasurable)  ideas  (suggested)  in  its  other  parts  ;  set  forth 
by  means  of  persons  acting,  and  not  by  means  of  narra- 
tion ;  and  through  pity  and  fear  effecting  the  purification 
of  those  passions.  .  .  .  The  most  important,  however,  of 
these  (requisites)  is  the  setting  together  of  the  inci- 
dents"  (vi.). 

"  It  will  then  be  granted  that  tragedy  is  the  imitation 
of  a  perfect  and  complete  action,  possessing  magnitude  ; 
for  there  may  be  a  whole  which  has  no  magnitude.  But 
a  whole  is  that  Avhich  has  a  beginning,  a  middle,  and  an 
end.  The  beginning  is  that  which,  of  necessity,  follows 
nothing  else,  but  after  w^hich  something  is  bound  to  be,  or 
to  be  produced.  The  end,  on  the  contrary,  is  that  which 
naturally  comes  after  something  else,  either  necessarily  or 

*  See  Prolss,  "  Geschichte  des  neueren  Dramas,"  ii.  1,  45;  and  Ebert, 

vassim. 


1 90  EntjUah  Literature. 

for  the  most  part,  but  after  which  there  is  nothing  else. 
The  middle,  however,  is  that  both  before  and  after  which 
there  is  something  else.  It  is  necessary,  then,  that  well- 
combined  fables  should  neither  begin  whence,  nor  end 
when,  chance  may  dictate,  but  should  be  composed  accord- 
ing to  the  above-mentioned  forms  "   (vii.). 

"  It  is  fit,  then,  that — just  as  in  other  imitative  arts  the 
imitation  is  the  imitation  of  one  single  thing — the  story, 
also,  since  it  is  the  imitation  of  an  action,  should  be  that 
of  one  whole  and  complete  action  ;  and  that  the  parts  of 
the  ti'ansactions  should  be  so  combined  that,  any  of  them 
being  transposed  or  taken  away,  the  whole  would  become 
different  and  disturbed." 

The  first  question  one  asks  after  reading  this,  even  in 
English,  is,  what  does  it  mean  ?  And  there  has  been  no  lack 
of  answers.  Corneille  said  :  "  I  maintain  that  the  unity 
of  action  consists,  in  comedy,  in  the  unity  of  the  intrigue, 
or  of  the  obstacles  offered  to  the  designs  of  the  principal 
personages  ;  in  tragedy,  in  the  unity  of  peril,  whether  it 
be  that  the  hero  sinks  under  it  or  extricates  himself  from 
it.  I  do  not,  of  course,  maintain  that  it  is  not  allowable 
to  admit  several  perils  in  the  one,  and  several  intrigues  or 
obstacles  in  the  other,  provided  that,  in  freeing  himself 
from  the  one,  the  personage  falls  of  necessity  into  the 
others"   ("  Troisierae  Discours"). 

Voltaire  ("Remarques  sur  le  Troisieme  Discours")  : 
"  We  think  that  Corneille  here  understands  by  unity  of  ac- 
tion and  of  intrigue  a  principal  action,  to  which  the  various 
interests  and  the  private  intrigues  are  subordinate,  form- 
ing a  whole  composed  of  several  parts,  all  tending  to  the 
same  object." 

La  IIar))e  says  :  "Aristotle  desires,  and  all  the  legislators 
on  the  subject  have  followed  liiin  in  this,  that  a  character 
be  the  same  at  the  end  as  at  the  beginning." 


English  Literature.  191 

Lessing,  more  clearly  ("  Hamburg.  Dramaturgie,"  38)  : 
"  There  is  nothing  that  Aristotle  has  more  strongly  rec- 
ommended to  the  poet  than  the  proper  composition  of  his 
story.  .  .  .  He  detines  the  story  as  the  imitation  of  an 
action,  and  the  action  is,  in  his  opinion,  the  connection 
of  the  incidents.  The  action  is  the  whole,  the  incidents 
are  the  component  parts  of  the  whole  ;  and  as  the  excel- 
lence of  any  complete  whole  depends  upon  the  excellence 
of  its  several  parts  and  their  combination,  so  also  is  a 
tragic  action  more  or  less  perfect  in  proportion  as  the 
incidents — each  for  itself  and  all  conjointly — are  in  har- 
mony with  the  purposes  of  the  tragedy."  It  is  clear  that 
tliere  is  no  great  divergence  of  opinion  about  this  rule  : 
the  playwright  is  directed  to  observe  coherence  in  his 
story,  to  make  it  of  one  piece,  so  to  speak,  and  this  no 
one  doubts  ;  and  although  La  Harpe's  rule  is  scarcely  to 
be  found  in  Aristotle,  it  is  so  undeniable  that  it  goes  into 
circulation  without  question. 

The  unanimity  with  which  this  rule  was  obeyed  inspired 
full  belief  in  the  second  rule,  that  of  unity  of  time, 
which  was  taken  to  mean  that  the  whole  action  must  be 
supposed  to  take  place  within  twenty-four  hours.  This 
inconvenient  rule  depended  on  thcvse  remarks  of  Aristotle: 
"  Moreover,  [the  epos  differs  from  the  tragedy],  as  regards 
length  ;  for  the  latter  attempts,  as  far  as  possible,  to  re- 
strict itself  to  a  single  revolution  of  the  sun,  or  to  exceed 
it  but  little,  whereas  the  epos  is  indefinite  as  regards  time, 
and  in  this  respect  differs-from  tragedy"  (v.). 

No  sooner  had  the  unities  become  the  law  in  France 
than  Corneille  began  to  chafe  under  them.  In  1636  ("  Troi- 
sieme  Discours  ")  he  wrote  :  "  For  my  part,  I  find  that  there 
are  subjects  so  hard  to  confine  within  the  limits  of  so  short 
a  time,  that  not  only  would  I  allow  them  the  full  twenty- 
four  hours,  but  I  would  even  take  advantage  of  the  liberty 


192  English  Literature . 

accorded  by  the  philosopher  to  exceed  them  in  some  meas- 
ure, and  would  without  hesitation  go  as  far  as  thirty 
hours."  Voltaire,  in  commenting  on  this,  says  :  "  The 
unity  of  time  is  founded  not  only  on  the  laws  of  Aris- 
totle, but  on  those  of  nature.  It  would,  in  fact,  be  extreme- 
ly proper  that  the  action  should  not  extend  beyond  the 
time  required  for  representation.  ...  It  is  clear,  how- 
ever, that  this  merit  may  be  sacrificed  to  a  much  greater 
one  —  that,  namely,  of  interesting  the  audience.  If  you 
can  cause  more  tears  to  flow  by  extending  your  action 
twenty-four  hours,  take  a  day  and  a  night,  but  do  not  go 
beyond  that.  If  you  did,  the  illusion  Avould  be  too  much 
impaired." 

The  attempt  of  Corneille  to  secure  thii'ty  hours  failed, 
however,  and  the  dramatists  bound  themselves  up  by  the 
rigid  rule  of  twenty-four  hours.  Into  what  trouble  their 
pedantry  brought  them  we  may  see  by  examining  a  sin- 
gle instance,  Corneille's  "Cid."  The  writer  said  :  "The 
unities  must  be  preserved,  there  can  be  no  doubt  about 
that,  but  we  must  have  thirty  hours."  Let  us  see  what 
in  this  case  thirty  hours  brought  forth.  The  heroine's 
father  gives  the  hero's  father  a  box  on  the  ear.  He 
is  consequently  challenged  to  a  duel  by  the  hero,  and 
killed.  The  heroine,  although  she  still  loves  him,  demands 
his  life  in  satisfaction  from  the  king,  who  orders  him  to 
join  the  campaign  against  the  Moors.  From  this  he  re- 
turns victorious,  having  performed  many  valiant  deeds, 
and  having  made  two  of  their  kings  prisoners.  The  im- 
placable heroine  still  demands  his  life,  whereupon  he  is 
commanded  to  meet  another  lover  in  single  combat,  the 
condition  being  that  she  shall  marry  the  survivor.  He 
is  naturally  successful  in  this  ;  he  disarms  his  rival,  spares 
his  life,  and  the  heroine  at  last  agrees  to  forgive  him. 
Corneille   saw   that    the    incidents  Avere   rather    crowded, 


English  Literature.  193 

and  that  the  "  Cid  "  well  deserved  two  or  three  days  of 
rest  after  his  campaign  before  being  called  upon  to  fight 
another  duel.  "  But  there,"  he  says,  "  you  see  the  incon- 
venience of  the  rule."  As  the  Academy  said  in  passing 
judgment  on  the  play  :  "The  poet,  in  trying  to  observe 
the  rules  of  art,  has  chosen  rather  to  sin  against  those  of 
nature."  After  that  reproof  Corneille  followed  the  rules 
more  closely,  and  throughout  the  French  classic  drama  we 
find  an  impossible  and  inartistic  huddling  of  incidents 
under  the  compulsion  of  this  obiter  dictum  of  Aristotle's. 
It  would  have  been  natural,  one  might  think,  to  examine 
the  Greek  plays  and  see  how  they  dealt  with  the  problem, 
and  whether  they  were  ever  allowed  greater  license.  But 
against  this  we  may  put  the  comparative  ignorance  of 
Greek  even  in  such  a  man  as  Voltaire  ;  and,  secondly,  the 
superstitious  adoration  of  Aristotle,  which  was  so  great 
that,  if  any  violations  of  his  rules  had  been  pointed  out, 
the  answer  would  doubtless  have  been  made  that  those 
who  broke  his  rules  were  bad  Greeks.* 

Yet  when  Lessing  began  his  attack  on  the  rules,  about 
one  hundred  years  ago,  he  did  what  should  have  been 
done  long  before:  he  went  back  to  the  Greek  p'iays.  And 
what  do  w^e  find  in  them  ?  Take  the  "  Agamemnon,"  for 
instance  ;  in  that  play,  as  Schlegel  put  it,  "  we  have  the 
whole  interval  between  the  destruction  of  Troy  and  the 
hero's  arrival  at  Mycenae.  In  the  'Trachinia'  of  Sopho- 
cles the  voyage  from  Thessaly  to  Euboea  is  made  three 
times.  In  the  '  Suppliants  '  of  Euripides,  during  one  cho- 
ral ode  an  army  is  supposed  to  march  from  Athens  to 
Thebes  to  fight  a  battle,  and  the  general  returns  victo- 
rious." The  appeal  to  the  Greek  dramatists  was  conse- 
quently misleading. 

*  As  indeed  happened  in  France;  vide  Ogier,  "Ancien  Theatre Fran9ais," 
vol.  viii. 

9 


194  Engl'iali  Literature. 

Even  more  markod  transgressions  may  be  found.  In 
the  "Alcestis,"  that  heroine  and  Hercules  descend  to  the 
h:)wer  regions,  and,  although  that  journe}-  is  said  to  be  easy 
and  short,  they  returned  thence,  which  is  proverbially  dif- 
ficult. 

Lessing  said  of  the  dramatists  who  obeyed  the  unities  : 
"  It  is  true  that  these  writers  pride  themselves  on  the  most 
scrupulous  regularity  ;  but  they  are  also  the  ones  who 
either  put  so  wide  a  construction  on  their  rules  that  it  is 
scarcely  worth  while  to  call  them  rules  at  all,  or  they  ob- 
serve them  in  so  awkward  and  constrained  a  way,  that  one 
is  more  shocked  to  see  them  observed  than  if  they  were 
not  observed  at  all."  He  takes  Voltaire's  "Merope"  to 
pieces,  and  asks  :  "  Of  what  use  is  it  to  the  poet  that  the 
incidents  of  each  act,  supposing  them  really  to  happen, 
should  not  occupy  more  time  than  the  performance  of  the 
act  really  demands  ;  and  that  this  time,  together  with  that 
allowed  for  the  pauses,  should  not  even  extend  to  a  full 
revolution  of  the  sun  ?  Is  that  a  reason  for  supposing 
that  he  has  observed  the  unity  of  time  ?  He  has  obeyed 
the  words  of  the  rule,  but  not  the  spirit;  for  what  he  puts 
into  one  day  might  possibly  -be  performed  in  that  time, 
but  no  sensible  man  would  do  it  in  that  time.  Physical 
unity  of  time  is  not  enough,  moral  unity  must  be  there 
too;  for  if  this  is  violated  every  one  will  notice  it;  where- 
as the  other  may  be  destroyed  without  general  notice." 

To  us,  whose  minds  are  made  up,  these  remarks,  which 
coincide  with  our  way  of  thinking,  seem  not  only  convinc- 
ing, but  also  sufficiently  obvious;  yet,  as  I  have  said,  for 
three  hundred  years  they  were  not  spoken  in  France,  and, 
as  we  have  seen,  every  means  was  taken  to  urge  the  oppo- 
site views  by  precept  and  example. 

Having  seen  the  fervor  with  which  these  o))ini()ns  were 
upheld,  we  shall  not  be  surprised  to  learn  that  in  tlie  "  Poet- 


English  Literature.  195 

icon  "  of  Aristotle  there  was  no  mention  of  the  third  rule, 
the  unity  of  place.*  The  invention  of  this  must  be  put 
down  to  the  account  of  the  French  critics,  on  which  side 
of  the  account  the  reader  must  decide  for  himself.  Cor- 
neille  groaned  beneath  this  rule,  and  urged  that  the  whole 


*  No  one  will  for  a  moment  imagine  that  the  trifling  fact  that  Aristotle 
never  said  anything  that  has  come  down  to  us  that  can  be  perverted  into 
support  of  the  unity  of  place  made  that  law  any  the  less  binding.  D'Au- 
bignac,  in  his  "Pratique  du  Theatre"  (l(i69),  said:  "Les  ignorants  et 
les  personnes  de  faible  esprit,  s'imaginent  que  I'unite  de  lieu  repugne  h, 
la  beaute  des  comedies.  .  .  .  Aristote,  dans  ce  qui  nous  reste  de  sa  Poe- 
tique,  n'en  a  rien  dit,  et  j'estimc  qu'il  la  negligee,  h  cause  que  cette  regie 
etait  trop  connue  de  son  temps." 

On  the  unity  of  time,  he  wrote  in  favor  of  limiting  the  action  to  twelve 
hours :  "  La  raison  en  est  certaine  et  fondee  sur  la  nature  du  po&me  drama- 
tique,  car  ce  poeme,  comme  nous  avons  dit  plusieurs  fois,  n'est  pas  dans 
les  recits,  mais  dans  les  actions  humaines,  dont  11  doit  paraitre  une  image 
sensible.  Or,  nous  ne  voyons  point  que  regulierement  les  hommes  agis- 
sent  avant  le  jour,  ni  qu'ils  portent  leurs  occupations  au-del^ ;  d'ou  vient, 
que,  dans  tons  les  etats,  il  y  a  des  magistrals  etablis  pour  reprimer  ceux 
qui  vaguent  la  nuit,  naturellemcnt  destinee  au  repos." 

Riccoboni,  in  explaining  the  horrors,  and  bloodshed  of  the  Shaksperiau 
plaj's,  says  ("Historical  and  Critical  Account  of  Theatres  in  Europe,"  Eng- 
lish transl.,  p.  171):  "  The  principal  character  of  the  English  is  that  they 
are  apt  to  be  plunged  in  contemplation  [they  "are  gentle,  humane,  extreme- 
ly polite,  but  generally  pensive  to  excess"],  as  I  said  before.  It  is  owing 
to  this  their  pensive  Mood  that  the  Sciences  of  the  most  sublime  Nature 
are  by  the  Writers  of  that  Nation  handled  with  much  Penetration,  and  that 
Arts  are  carried  to  that  Pitch  of  Perfection  which  they  are  now  arrived  at; 
because  their  native  Melancholy  supplies  them  with  that  Patience  and  Ex- 
actness which  other  Countries  have  not.  ...  To  pursue  my  reasoning ;  I  be- 
lieve that  were  there  to  be  Exhibited  on  their  Stage  Tragedies  of  a  more 
refined  Taste,  that  is,  stripped  of  those  Horrors  that  sully  the  stage  with 
Blood,  the  audience  would  perhaps  fall  asleep.  The  Experience  whicli 
their  earliest  Dramatic  Writers  had  of  this  Truth,  led  them  to  establi.<li 
this  Species  of  Tragedy,  to  raise  *hem  out  of  their  contemplative  Moods, 
hv  such  bold  Strokes  as  might  awaken  them." 


196  English  Literature. 

of  a  play  should  be  represented  within  the  limits  of  one 
town.  "  Of  course,"  he  says,  "  I  should  not  wish  the  stage 
to  represent  a  whole  town  ;  that  would  be  somewhat  too 
vast,  but  merely  two  or  three  particular  places  enclosed 
within  its  walls."    Voltaire  held  a  similar  view.    He  says  : 

"  We  have  before  said  that  the  imperfect  construction 
of  our  theatres — ^lianded  down  from  the  days  of  our  bar- 
barism to  the  present  time — has  made  the  rule  of  unity  of 
place  almost  impossible.  The  conspirators  cannot  con- 
spire against  Coesar  in  his  own  cabinet ;  people  do  not 
talk  about  their  most  secret  interests  in  a  public  place  ; 
the  same  scene  cannot  represent  at  once  the  front  of  a 
palace  and  that  of  a  temple.  The  stage  ought  to  be  so 
arranged  as  to  bring  before  the  eye  all  the  pailicular 
places  where  the  scene  is  laid,  without  injury  to  the  unity 
of  place.  Here  a  part  of  a  temple  ;  there  the  vestibule  of 
a  palace  ;  a  public  square  ;  streets  in  the  background — in 
short,  everything  necessary  for  presenting  to  the  eye  all 
that  the  ear  ought  to  hear.  The  unity  of  place  is  the 
whole  view  Avhich  the  eye  can  embrace  without  difficulty." 

But  this  is  a  clumsy  contrivance.  Even  this  accumula- 
tion of  architectural  monuments,  like  those  on  the  cover 
of  the  atlases,  representing  civilization,  can  be  of  but 
little  service,  and  we  need  not  wonder  that  in  his  "  Bru- 
tus "  Voltaire  was  forced  to  resort  to  the  transparent  de- 
vice of  having  two  of  the  characters  '■'' siqyposed  to  have 
quitted  the  audience-chamber  and  to  be  in  another 'apart- 
ment in  Brutus's  house."  In  his  "  Semiramis,"  the  tomb 
of  Ninus  is  brought  into  the  drawing-room  !  However,  it 
is  idle  work  killing  the  dead.  The  unities  have  gone  to 
the  curiosity  chamber,  along  with  the  Ptolemaic  system  of 
astronomy  and  tlie  notion  that  all  languages  are  derived 
from  the  Hebrew.  The  theory  had  its  strong  side,  how- 
ever, although  in  Italy  it  helped  to  produce  nothing  of 


Enylish  Literature.  197 

importance.  In  France  it  inspired  a  love  for  smoothness  of 
form  and  neatness  of  execution.  It  is,  of  course,  impossible 
to  imagine  what  would  have  been  the  course  of  literature 
in  France  if  it  had  not  prevailed  there,  because  it  did  pre- 
vail there  from  seeming  abundantly  good  to  those  who 
were  in  power.*  Remember  that  it  stood  for  light  and 
truth  in  contrast  with  what  seemed  to  the  men  of  that  day 
the  detestable  barbarism  of  the  Middle  Ages,  and  that  the 
task  of  that  time,  as  of  all  times,  was  to  attain  higher  civ- 
ilization. Their  sole  beacon  was  the  light  from  antiq- 
uity, the  rays  of  which  were  supposed  to  be  concentrated 
in  Aristotle,  and  they  obeyed  him  as  earnestly  as  pos- 
sible. Their  yearnings  for  greater  freedom  they  probably 
repressed  as  proofs  of  an  unregenerate  nature,  and  if  we 
find  their  classic  plays  dull,  it  is  easy  to  see  what  they 
thought  of  ours.  Here  is  Voltaire  describing  an  English 
play — and  bear  in  mind  that  Voltaire  was  not  only  one  of 
the  ablest  men  of  his  time,  but  of  any  time,  and  that,  al- 
though he  was  not  averse  to  misrepresentation  when 
there  was  anything  to  be  got  by  it,  he  was  intellectually 
honest.  He  says  ("  Introduction  to  Semiramis,"  Qiluvres, 
v.  194)  :  "I  am  very  far  from  justifying  the  tragedy  in 
everything :  it  is  a  rude  and  barbarous  piece.  .  .  .  The 
hero  goes  mad  in  the  second  act,  and  his  mistress  in  the 
third.     The  prince  slays  the  father  of  his  mistress,  pre- 

*  La  Motte  and  Fontenelle,  among  others,  however,  agreed  in  detesting 
the  unities,  long  monologues,  confidants,  and  the  use  of  rhyme  in  plays, 
and  were  consequently  cordially  hated  by  their  contemporaries,  notably  by 
the  critics. 

Fontenelle  defended  the  moderns ;  we  too  shall  become  ancients,  he 
says,  "on  nous  admirera  avec  excfes  dans  les  siecles  h,  venir." — "  Dieu  sait 
avee  quel  mepris  on  traitera  en  comparison  de  nous  les  beaux-esprits  de 
ce  temps-la,  qui  pourront  bien  etre  des  Amei'icaius." — Sainte-Beuve,  "  Cau- 
series  du  Lundi,"  iii.,  332. 


198  Kiujllali  Ldti'Lttare. 

tending  to  kill  a  rat,  and  the  hei'oine  throws  herself  into 
the  river.  They  dig  her  grave  on  the  stage  ;  the  grave- 
diggers  jest  in  a  way  worthy  of  them,  with  skulls  in  their 
hands  ;  the  hero  answers  their  odious  grossness  by  ex- 
travagances no  less  disgusting.  Meanwhile,  one  of  the 
characters  conquers  Poland.  The  hero,  his  father,  and 
mother  drink  together  on  the  stage  ;  they  sing  at  table, 
they  wrangle,  they  fight,  they  kill;  one  might  suppose 
such  a  work  to  be  the  fruit  of  the  imagination  of  a  drunk- 
en savage.  But  in  the  midst  of  all  these  rude  irregular- 
ities, which  to  this  day  make  the  English  theatre  so  ab- 
surd and  so  barbarous,  there  are  to  be  found  in  '  Hamlet,' 
by  a  yet  greater  incongruity,  sublime  strokes  worthy  of 
the  loftiest  geniuses.  It  seems  as  if  nature  had  taken  a 
delight  in  collecting  within  the  brain  of  Shakspere  all  that 
we  can  imagine  of  what  is  greatest  and  most  powerful, 
with  all  that  rudeness  without  wit  can  contain  of  what 
is  lowest  and  most  detestable." 

One  is  tempted  here  to  go  on  to  a  comparison  between 
English  and  French  tragedy  ;  but  this  would  take  us 
wholly  away  from  our  path.  It  concerns  us  now  to 
consider  simply  the  fate  of  these  laws.  In  France,  they 
survived  the  general  wreck  of  the  Revolution  ;  Sundays 
were  banished,  and  the  week  brought  into  the  decimal 
system  ;  *  religion  was  abolished  ;  kings  and  aristocrats 
were  murdered — but,  as  Brandes  pointed  out,  "  While  in 
all  external  matters  France  is  inclined  to  change,  and  in 
following  this  inclination  knows  no  limits  or  moderation, 
it  is  yet  in  all  literary  matters  exceedingly  conservative, 
recognizing  authority,  maintaining  an  academy,  and  ob- 
serving moderation.     The  French  had  overthrown  their 

*  It  will  be  remembered  that  this  demolition  of  the  Sabbath  is  some- 
times brought  up  in  all  seriousness  as  an  argument  against  substituting 
the  metre  and  the  gramme  for  the  yardstick  and  ounce. 


Kuijlish  Llitrature.  199 

government,  hanged  or  banished  the  odious  aristocrats, 
established  a  republic,  carried  on  war  with  Europe,  done 
away  with  Christianity,  decreed  the  worship  of  a  Supreme 
Being,  deposed  and  set  up  a  dozen  rulers,  before  it  occurred 
to  any  one  to  declare  war  against  the  Alexandrine  verse, 
before  any  one  ventured  to  question  the  authority  of  Cor- 
neille  or  Boileau,  or  to  feel  any  doubt  that  the  observance 
of  the  three  unities  was  absolutely  essential  to  the  preser- 
vation of  good  taste.  Voltaire,  who  had  but  little  resj)ect 
for  anything  in  the  heaven  above  or  in  the  earth  beneath, 
yet  respected  the  Alexandrine.  He  turned  tradition  to^jsy- 
turvy  ;  made  his  tragedies  attacks  upon  the  powers  they 
had  hitherto  supported,  namely,  the  right  of  kings  and  of 
the  church  ;  from  many  of  them  he  excluded  love,  which 
previously  had  formed  the  main  interest  in  real  tragedy  ; 
he  tried  to  follow  in  Shakspere's  footsteps  :  but  he  did 
not  venture  to  shorten  his  line  by  a  single  foot,  to  make 
the  least  alteration  in  the  conventional  method  of  rhym- 
ing, or  to  make  the  action  last  more  than  twenty-four 
hours,  or  to  lay  it  in  two  different  places  in  one  play. 
He  did  not  hesitate  to  wrench  the  sceptre  from  the  hand 
of  kings,  or  to  tear  the  mask  from  the  face  of  priests,  but 
he  respected  the  traditional  dagger  in  Melpomene's  hand 
and  the  traditional  mask  before  her  face." 

Voltaire,  it  must  be  remembered,  had  a  very  sincere  de- 
testation of  wilfulness  and  obscurity,  and  great  love  of  neat 
Avorkmanship  and  literary  polish.  In  good  part  through 
his  authority,  the  unities  survived  in  France  until  Victor 
Hugo  began  to  write  jjlays.*     The  preface  to  "  Cromwell  " 

*  It  must  not  be  forgotten  how  often  the  rules  were  questioned,  and  with 
ever-growing  force,  by  successive  dramatists  in  tlie  hist  century.  It  was 
probably  Voltaire's  influence  that  maintained  them  so  long,  for  there 
were  many  able  men,  less  authoritative  than  he,  however,  who  were 
attacking  them  by  precept  and   example.     The  full  history  of  the   pro- 


200  Kn(jl'iii]t  Literature. 

(1827)  was  a  violent  attack  upon  them,  but  it  was  over  his 
"  Hernani "  that  the  fight  was  really  fought  and  the  vic- 
tory won.  Of  course  there  had  been  men  who  objected 
to  the  rigid  rules,  such  as  La  Motte  (1672-1731),  but  his 
objections  were  without  influence ;  it  was  Victor  Hugo 
who  fairly  broke  these  chains.  Feb.  25,  1830,  this  play 
was  first  acted,  amid  wild  confusion.  Theophile  Gautier, 
in  his  "  Histoire  du  Romantisme,"  says  : 

"  How  can  any  one  imagine  that  this  line, 
"  Est-il  raiiiuit  ? — Minuit  bientot," 
should  have  called  forth  a  tempest,  and  that  the  fight 
lasted  three  days '?  The  phrase  seemed  trivial,  familiar, 
indecorous  :  a  king  asks  what's  o'clock,  like  a  private  citi- 
zen, and  they  tell  him,  as  if  he  were  a  ploughboy,  mid- 
night.'''' 

The  rules  fell  with  a  crash  into  unrecognizable  ruin. 
In  Italy,  a  play  of  Manzoni's,  "  II  Conte  di  Carmagnola  " 
(1820),  was  the  first  to  break  the  charmed  regulations,  but 
Victor  Hugo  destroyed  the  citadel  after  the  outposts  had 

tracted  discussion  concerning  them  belongs  rather  to  the  study  of  French 
than  of  English  literature.  ( Vide  Charles  Formentin's  "  Essai  sur  les 
Origines  du  Drarae  Moderne  en  France."  Paris,  18*79.)  Tlie  most  impor- 
tant of  these  writers  were  Diderot,  Beaumarchais,  Mercier,  Sedaiue,  etc. 
It  yet  remains  true  that,  while  these  men  skirmished  bravely,  Victor  Hugo 
routed  the  enemy  and  won  the  victory. 

In  his  "  Bijou.\  Indiscrets,"  chap,  xxxviii.,  Diderot  said,  speaking  of  the 
classic  stage:  "  Eti  admirez-vons  la  conduite?  Elle  est  ordinairement  si 
compliquee  que  ce  serait  un  miracle  qu'il  se  fut  passe  tant  de  choses  en  si 
pen  de  temps.  La  mine  ou  la  conservation  d'un  empire,  le  mariage  d'une 
princesse,  la  perte  d'un  prince,  tout  cela  s'execute  d'un  tour  de  main. 
S'agit-il  d'une  conspiration,  on  Tebauche  an  premier  acte,  elle  est  liee, 
affermio  au  second  ;  toutes  les  mesures  sout  prises,  les  obstacles  leves,  les 
conspirateurs  disposes  au  troisieme;  11  y  aura  incessament  une  revoke,  un 
combat,  peut-etre  une  bataille  range'e,  et  vous  appelez  cela :  conduite,  ia- 
teret,  chaleur,  vraiscmblance." 


Knglish  Literature.  201 

surrendered.  The  length  of  the  struggle  between  reason 
and  reasonableness  shows  how  hard  it  is  to  expel  bigotry, 
pedantry,  obstinacy,  and  all  the  respectable  vices. 

To  return  to  Addison's  "  Cato,"  which  was  published  in 
1713:  its  only  interest  is,  so  to  speak,  an  archceological  one, 
as  an  example  of  a  rare  phenomenon,  and  as  a  proof  of  the 
spread  of  waves  of  thought.  We  see  that  it  took  about  two 
hundred  years  for  the  form  devised  by  Trissino  to  reach 
London,  it  having  reached  Paris  in  one  hundred  and  twenty 
years  ;  and  the  wave  that  overwhelmed  France  made  but 
a  slight  disturbance  in  England,*  for,  at  the  most,  less 
than  a  dozen  plays  can  be  counted  among  those  written 
after  this  model,  and  Otway's  "  Venice  Preserved  "  and 
Congreve's  "  Mourning  Bride  "  may  well  be  counted  out. 
The  only  other  at  all  well  kno^Ti,  excepting  Lillo's  "  Fatal 
Curiosity,"  is  Johnson's  "Irene"  (1749),  and  if  Johnson's 
fame  depended  on  that  play  his  name  would  have  been 
lost  long  since.f 

*  Vide  "  Lectures  on  Poetry,"  delivered  1 711,  at  Oxford,  by  Dr.  Trapp, 
of  whom  Dr.  Young  wrote,  "  Satire  I.,  Works,"  iii.  106 : 

"  If  at  liis  title  Trapp  had  dropp'd  his  quill 
Trapp  might  have  passed  for  a  great  genius  still. 
But  Trapp,  alas  !  (excuse  him  if  you  can) 
Is  now  a  scribbler,  who  was  once  a  man." 
This,  however,  probably  refers  to  his  political  pamphlets.     He  warmly  de- 
fended the  unities. 

f  Yet  it  is  curious  to  observe  that  two  thirds  of  Browning's  plays  ob- 
serve the  unity  of  time  —  viz.,  "  Pippa  Passes,"  "The  Return  of  the 
Druses,"  "  A  Blot  on  the  Scutcheon,"  "  Colombo's  Birthday,"  "  Luria," 
and  "In  a  Balcony."  The  "Blot  on  the  Scutcheon"  was  written  in  fiva . 
days,  as  was  also  "  The  Return  of  the  Druses  "  (vide  Academy,  Dec.  24, 
1881).  It  would  be  hard  to  say  that  Browning  deliberately  sought  this 
unity.  It  doubtless  came  from  what  we  may  call  the  instantaneousness 
of  his  intellectual  processes.  He  almost  always  chooses  for  his  subject 
a  single  mood  or  passion. 


202  KiKjlU/i  Littrature. 

What  you  will  have  noticed  here,  as  I  trust  elsewhere, 
is  the  close  connection  between  the  literary  tenets  of  the 
time  and  the  general  condition  of  thouoht.  To  be  sure, 
these  do  not  alM'ays  precisely  coincide.  AVe  tiud  the  regu- 
lar drama  existing  throughout  the  French  Revolution,  only 
giving  way  later  before  the  attacks  of  the  Romanticists, 
yet,  in  general,  the  widespread  views  of  a  ])eriod  affect 
immediately  the  literary  methods  ;  in  this  case,  too,  the 
first  leisure  was  devoted  to  making  the  drama  over  again. 
The  task  of  our  ancestors  was  establishing  civilization  and 
driving  out  barbarism,  and  what  seemed  to  them  one  of 
their  first  duties  was  expelling  barbarism  from  literature. 
What  they  thought  barbarous,  the  Gothic  architecture, 
mountains,  and  certain  forms  of  poetry,  we  have  learned 
to  enjoy.  If  we  bear  these  things  in  mind,  and  watch  the 
srrowth  of  modern  feelino's  during  the  last  century,  we 
shall  get  to  understand  the  present  better.  There  is,  too, 
an  advantage  in  studying  a  period  of  unbrilliant  jjerlorui- 
ance,  that  it  gives  an  op])ortunity  to  see  how  (>})inioiis 
grow. 

As  to  the  play  itself,  and  the  excitement  it  produced, 
it  was  enormously  admired.  The  political  ct)ndition  only 
added  to  the  excitement  ;  party  feeling  ran  high,  and,  as 
Macaulay  said,  it  Avas  hoped  that  "  the  public  would  dis- 
cover some  analogy  between  the  followers  of  Ca'sar  and 
the  Tories,  between  Sempronius  and  the  apostate  Whigs, 
and  between  Cato,  struggling  to  the  last  for  the  liberties 
of  Rome,  and  the  band  of  patriots  who  still  stood  firm 
round  Halifax  and  Wharton."  The  Tories,  however,  were 
not  to  be  outdone  ;  each  side  determined  to  find  nothing 
but  compliments  for  itself  in  the  political  setting.  Pope 
wrote  that  the  applause  "  of  the  Whig  i)arty,  on  the  one 
side,  was  echoed  back  by  the  Tt)ries  on  the  other,  and  af- 
ter all  the  applauses  of  the  opposite  faction,  Lord  Boling- 


Engllali  Literature.  203 

broke  sent  for  Booth,  who  played  Cato,  into  his  box,  and 
presented  him  with  fifty  guineas  in  acknowledgment  (as 
he  expressed  it)  for  defending  the  cause  of  liberty  so  well 
against  a  per|)etual  dictator." 

Bishop  Berkeley  was  at  the  performance  with  Addison, 
"  and  two  or  three  more  friends  in  a  side-box,  where  we 
had  a  table  and  two  or  three  flasks  of  Burgundy  and 
champagne,  with  which  the  authoj;  (who  is  a  very  sober 
man)  thought  it  necessary  to  support  his  spirits.  .  .  .  Some 
parts  of  the  prologue,  written  by  Mr.  Pope,  a  Tor\',  and 
even  a  Papist,  were  hissed,  being  thought  to  savour  of 
AVhigism,  but  the  clap  got  much  the  better  of  the  hiss  " 
{Academy,  Sept.  6,  1879). 

Even  in  Dr.  Johnson's  time,  the  "  Cato "  had  come  to 
be  regarded  as  "  rather  a  poem  in  dialogue  than  a  drama, 
rather  a  succession  of  just  sentiments  in  elegant  language 
than  a  representation  of  natural  affections,  or  of  any  prob- 
able or  possible  in  human  life."  And  Dr.  Johnson  said  : 
"  About  things  on  which  the  public  thinks  long,  it  com- 
monly attains  to  think  right ;"  and  now,  having  thought 
longer,  the  public  has  attained  to  think  that  it  will  not 
read  "  Cato,"  and  I  need  dwell  on  it  no  longer. 

Its  effect  was  to  lend  the  authority  of  Addison's  name 
to  this  formal  way  of  writing  plays.  In  Germany,  Gott- 
sched  *  wrote  "  Der  Sterbende  Cato  "  (written  1731,  pub- 

*  Gottsched  was  by  no  means  satisfied  with  Addison's  work ;  vide  Ricco- 
boni,  "Account  of  Theatres"  (Engl,  transl.),  226  et  seq. :  "I  was  at  first 
advised  literally  to  translate  Addison's  '  Cato,'  but  as  I  was  resolved  to 
stick  to  the  rules  of  the  drama,  I  found  he  fell  far  short  in  regularity  to 
the  French  tragedy.  The  English  are  indeed  great  masters  both  of  thought 
and  expression ;  they  know  wonderfully  well  how  to  sustain  a  character, 
and  enter  surprisingly  into  the  heart  of  man  ;  but  as  to  the  conduct  of  the 
Fable  they  are  very  careless,  as  appears  from  all  their  dramatic  composi- 
tions," etc. ;  and  "  tlie  scenes  are  very  ill-connected  together ;  the  actors 
go  and  come  without  any  apparent  reason  ;  sometimes  the  stage  is  quite 


204  English  Literature. 

lished  1732),  in  imitation  of  this  and  a  French  play  by 
Deschamps  (1715),  and  in  England  the  tradition  of  the 
Elizabethan  drama  was  rendered  fainter  than  ever.  If  we 
are  inclined  to  condemn  Addison,  we  must  remember  that 
what  he  was  really  endeavoring  to  supersede  was  the 
exaggerations  of  Dryden,  Lee,  and  their  contemporaries 
of  the  post-Restoration  stage.  In  the  place  of  rant  he  put 
a  sort  of  decorous  eloquence.  The  play  reads  not  so  much 
like  the  work  of  a  poet  as  like  that  of  an  intelligent  and 
able  man,  who  has  deliberately  made  up  his  mind  to  write 
a  tragedy,  and  who  has  put  a  number  of  dignified  thoughts 
into  the  most  elegant  language  he  could  find.  Addison's 
intelligence  was  sufficient  to  save  him  from  gross  faults, 
but  not  enough  to  inspire  him  to  write  a  real  tragedy. 

empty,"  etc.  Hence  he  combined  the  English  and  the  French  models,  and 
wrote  his  own  "  Cato." 

Gottsched's  play  went  through  ten  editions  by  1757  (Koberstein,  v.  286, 
note  10).  Freiherr  von  Bielefeld  said  :  "Es  sei  eine  Tragodie,  die  in  alien 
Sprachen  der  Welt  schoa  sein  wiirde  "  (Koberstein,  he.  cit.). 


iLngllsh  Literature.  20  = 


CHAPTER  VI. 

I.  The  never-ending  question  suggests  itself  here,  What 
is  real  jioetry  ?  We  cannot  help  wondering  how  it  is  that 
such  frigid  pi'opriety  as  tills  the  "  Cato  "  should  have  given 
full  satisfaction  to  our  grandfathers  and  grandmothers. 
And  while  we  may  be  willing  to  acknowledge  that  the 
"  Cato  "  was  admired  quite  as  much  because  Addison 
wrote  it  as  for  anything  else,  this  does  not  explain  its  long 
success.  The  question,  too,  comes  up  again  with  regard 
to  Pope,  who  was  the  head  of  the  poetical  school  of  his 
time.  Nowadays  the  reading  world  may  be  said  to  be 
divided  into  classes,  one  of  which  avei's  that  Pope  was 
a  great  poet,  while  the  other  wonders  how  it  is  possible 
to  call  him  a  poet  at  all.  It  may  well  be  that  these 
contending  foes  will  very  nearly  agree  concerning  what 
they  find  in  Pope  ;  what  divides  them  is  the  proper  defini- 
tion of  poetry.  It  would  be  a  difficult  matter  to  furnish 
this.  Various  attempts  have  been  made  to  do  it,  but  I 
know  none  that  satisfies  every  one,  and  there  would  seem 
to  be  this  objection  to  all  definitions  :  that  they  must  be 
made  by  judging  past  methods  of  writing  poetry,  and  next 
year  there  may  be  found  a  new  way  which  will  not  accord 
with  the  rule.  INIoreover,  they  will  be  made  to  suit  but  a 
single  period.  In  fact,  however,  this  discussion  would  not 
only  take  us  into  a  very  confused  region,  but  it  would  be 
wanton  straying  from  the  work  we  have  now  before  us, 


2o6  EinjUalL  L'deratui'e. 

which  is  looking  at  what  was  liked  in  the  last  century,  and 
trying  to  find  its  relation  to  what  went  before  and  what 
has  followed  it.* 

In  general,  we  are  inclined  to  make  such  a  definition 
of  poetiy  as  shall  include  the  work  of  the  poets  we 
like  and  exclude  most  of  the  rest.  Those  who  demand 
that  poetry  shall  be  compact  of  imagination,  that  it  shall 
arouse  or  charm  the  emotions,  rather  than  give  a  cooler 
intellectual  delight,  may  give  Pope  all  the  credit  his 
admirers  claim  for  his  intelligence — to  state  it  broadly — 
without  consenting  to  place  him  among  the  singers  who 
delight  us  in  a  very  different  way.  As  contrasted  with 
these  singers,  as  we  may  call  them,  among  whom  any  one 
may  place  his  favorite — say  Keats,  Byron,  Shelley,  Tenny- 
son, Browning,  or  Mrs.  Browning — Pope  may  be  called  a 
talker,  or  rather  a  converser.  He  is  the  best  of  convers- 
ers,  and  there  is  a  great  deal  implied  in  that  title  :  wit, 
tact,  knowledge  of  men  and  the  world,  wisdom,  a  clever 
tongue — and  all  of  these  things  Pope  had.  In  short,  he  is 
the  flower  of  the^j)eriod  which  we  are  studying  ;  not  neces- 
sarily the  greatest  man,  for  Dryden  leaves  upon  the  reader 
an  impression  of  magnitude,  of  being  greater  than  what  he 
accomplished,  which  we  do  not  feel  about  Pope,  who  was 
perfectly  successful  in  putting  what  was  best  of  himself 
into  literature,  and  into  classical  literature.  The  aim  of 
the  period  in  which  he  lived  was  to  let  reasonableness, 
common-sense,  have  full  sway,  and  nowhere  did  it  find 
fujler  expression  iij  English  literature  than  iiiTojie. 

The  period  was  an  interesting  one  in  respect  to  the  nuin 
of  letters,  whose  position,  however,  was  not  secure,  although 
the  Spectator  had  created  a  large  reading  public.     It  may 

*  In  the  Contemporary  Review  for  December,  1881,  and  Janiuirv,  1S8'J, 
are  two  interesting  articles  by  Mr.  Alfred  Austin,  discussing  Mr.  Matthew 
Arnold's  definition  of  poetry  as  a  criticism  of  life. 


Eii(jlit<h  Littvature.  207 

be  worth  while  to  see  how  it  was  that  writers  gradually 
acquired  independence.  We  have  seen  how  in  tlie  reign 
of  Queen  Anne,  the  Augustan  age  of  English  literature, 
as  it  is  called,  authors  were  rewarded  ;  but,  while  it  is 
probably  true  that  this  was  in  some  measure  due  to  the 
fact  that  their  patrons  had  a  disinterested  love  of  litera- 
ture, it  must  not  be  forgotten  that  the  higher  rewards 
were  given  for  value  received.  Addison's  various  appoint- 
ments were  in  j-eturn  f  or  work  accomplished  with  the  pen, 
and  the  politics  of  the  writers  of  this  time  had  much  to  do 
with  their  success.  DrydciTs  satires  liad  shown  (as  I  have 
said)  how  great  was  the  power  of  an  able  pen,  and  those 
who  were  in  authority  sought  to  get  these  valuable  allies 
on  their  side.  Thus  Locke,  who  had  been  suspected  of 
connection  with  Shaftesbury's  treason,  had  left  England 
to  avoid  trouble  in  1683,  and  had  returned  after  the  arri- 
val of  William  of  Orange  in  1089,  was  within  a  week 
offered  an  ambassadorship,  which  he  declined,  and  was 
soon  made  commissioner  of  appeals.  What  literature 
could  have  done  for  him,  we  may  perceive  from  the  fact 
that  he  sold  the  copyright  of  his  famous  "  Essay "  for 
£30.  This  place  was  of  the  nature  of  a  sinecure,  and 
the  pay,  £1000  a  year.  Locke,  who  had  shown  great  in- 
terest in  the  practical  matters  of  politics,  worked  liard  at 
the  duties  of  the  position  when  these  were  enlarged,  but 
resiffned  it  when  he  felt  unable  to  give  them  full  atten- 
tion.  He  was  succeeded  by  Prior,  the  poet.  Prior,  the 
story  runs,  was  the  son  of  a  joiner,  who,  when  his  father 
died,  fell  under  the  charge  of  his  uncle,  who  intended  to 
let  his  education  end  with  studying  under  the  famous  Dr. 
Busby,  at  Westminster  school  ;  but  the  Earl  of  Dorset 
happened  to  see  him  reading  Horace,  which  so  gratified 
him  that  he  sent  him  to  Cambridge.  Li  1691,  when  twen- 
ty-five years  old,  he  was  sent  as  secretary  to  the  embassy 


2o8  Enijliiih  Literature. 

to  the  congress  at  the  Hague,  and  again,  in  1697,  to  another 
embassy  to  negotiate  the  treaty  of  Ryswick  ;  the  next 
year  he  was  given  the  same  office  at  the  court  of  France. 
Before  succeeding  Locke  he  was  under-secretary  of  state 
for  a  short  time.  Sir  Isaac  Newton  was,  in  1695,  by  the 
influence  of  his  friend  Charles  Montague,  earl  of  Halifax, 
made  warden  of  the  mint,  with  a  salary  of  £600  ;  and  in 
1699  he  succeeded  to  the  mastership,  with  a  salary  of  from 
£1200  to  £1500,  and  this  position  he  held  until  his  death 
in  1727.  This  position  was  given  to  him  not  merely  in 
admiration  of  his  mathematical  labors,  but  partly  in  return 
for  his  defence  of  the  authorities  of  the  University  of  Cam- 
bridge before  the  high-commission  court,  where  they  were 
summoned  to  answer  for  their  refusal  to  admit  Father 
Francis  Master  of  Arts  on  the  king's  (James  II.)  manda- 
mus, without  his  taking  the  oaths.  He  was  twice  elected 
to  Parliament.  Steele,  as  we  have  seen,  held  various  posi- 
tions under  government.  From  1694  to  1699  Defoe  was 
employed  as  accountant  to  the  commissioners  of  the  glass- 
duty  for  his  aid  to  the  government,  and  Defoe  wrote  a 
countless  number  of  political  writings.  Indeed,  we  are  only 
too  ready  to  overlook  most  of  the  political  work  which  lit- 
erary men  did  in  those  days.  Prior  not  only  wrote  a  num- 
ber of  odes  (one  of  them,  1706,  in  Spenser's  stanza,  and" 
avowedly  in  imitation  of  his  style),  epistles,  prologues,  etc., 
full  of  political  references  ;  he  also  contributed  to  the  Ex- 
aminer, a  Toryjournal.  Congreve  sang  victories,  mourned 
the  death  of  Queen  Mary,  and  was  made  a  commissioner 
for  licensing  hackney-coaches.  Vanbrugh  went  to  France 
as  a  sort  of  spy,  and  was  locked  up  in  the  Bastile  for  nearly 
two  years.  Indeed,  it  would  be  hard  to  find  one  of  the 
writers  of  this  time  who  did  not  devote  his  pen  to  the  ser- 
vice of  one  of  the  political  parties,  and  sometimes  of  both  : 
Ambrose  Philips,  Rowe,  Gay,  Stepney,  Eusden,  Hughes, 


English  Literature.  209 

Garth,  Arbuthnot,  Blackmore,  Tickell,  Shadwell — the  list 
could  be  made  very  long — were  all  of  them  rewarded  in 
one  way  or  another  :  the  instances  I  have  given  will  show 
what  I  mean  by  this. 

That  the  writers  were  necessary  to  the  politicians  is 
clear  from  the  rewards  they  received,  and  is  explained  by 
a  brief  examination.  The  debates  in  Parliament,  it  will 
be  remembered,  could  not  at  that  time  be  reported.  Even 
in  1745,  they  were  printed  in  the  Gentleman'' s  Magazine 
as  the  "  Discussions  in  the  Senate  of  Lilliput."  The  Lords 
were  called  Hurgoes  ;  Lord  Hardwicke,  Hurgo  Hickrad  ; 
the  archbishop  of  Oxford,  the  Archbishop  of  Oxdorf.  In 
the  Clinabs  (Commons),  Wyndham  was  Yamdahm  ;  Fox, 
Feaucs,  etc.  Degulia  stood  for  Europe,  Mildendo  for  Lon- 
don, Blefuscu  for  France,  the  Jacomites  for  the  Jacobites. 
In  the  Scots'  Magazine,  Sir  Robert  Walpole  was  Marcus 
Tullius  Cicero  ;  Pulteney,  Cato,  etc.  Consequently,  the 
only  way  in  which  the  public  could  be  kept  in  close  rela- 
tions with  Parliament — and  in  the  last  resort  the  support 
of  the  public  was  necessary — was  by  means  of  the  news- 
papers, pamphlets,  political  poems,  etc.  Ministers  them- 
selves wrote  for  the  papers,  and  they  were  compelled  to 
secure  some  authors  as  their  allies,  as  well  as  to  keep  oth- 
ers in  their  pay  to  prevent  their  going  over  to  the  oppo- 
site camp.  Nowhere  do  we  find  the  whole  current  of  in- 
trigue between  politicians  and  authors  more  clearly  related 
than  in  Swift's  "  Journal,"  or  more  distinctly  illustrated 
than  by  his  career.  He  was  Vicar  of  Laracor,  in  Ireland, 
when  he  wrote  his  first  political  tract,  the  "  Dissensions  in 
Athens  and  Rome"  (iVOl),  in  which  the  politicians  of  his 
time  were  disguised  under  ancient  names,  with  application 
to  the  existing  state  of  affairs.  In  this  paper  he  urged  a 
just  balance  of  power  at  home  as  necessary  for  preserving 
the  freedom  of  the  state.     This  was  in  1701,  when  Swift 


210  EityUsfi  Literature. 

was  thirty-four  years  old.  Halifax  and  Soracrs,  when  they 
had  ascertained  who  wrote  it,  received  him  with  great 
warmth  and  many  promises  of  support — indeed,  proposed 
him  for  a  bishopric.  But  they  could  not  keep  their  prom- 
ises, which  filled  Swift  with  bitter  disappointment  ;  so 
that,  when  the  Whigs  went  out  and  the  Tories  came  in,  he 
hastened  from  the  obscurity  of  Ireland  to  London  in  or- 
der to  see  for  himself  how  matters  stood.  Naturally  his 
appearance  on  the  scene  was  of  great  service  to  him.  The 
absent  are  always  wrong,  the  French  say,  and  the  absent 
are  pretty  sure  not  to  be  in  the  way  of  picking  up  promo- 
tion which  is  eagerly  contended  for  by  many  applicants. 
The  Whigs  were  profuse  w^ith  a])ologies  and  new  prom- 
ises, and  the  Tories,  eager  for  such  an  ally,  tempted  Swift 
in  every  way  in  their  power.  He  had,  meanwhile,  given 
further  proof  of  his  ability,  though  scarcely  of  respect  for 
the  conventional  side  of  ecclesiasticism,  by  writing  his 
"  Tale  of  a  Tub "  ( taking  the  hint,  doubtless,  from  a 
writing  of  Fontenelle's,  "  History  of  Mero  and  Enegu  " — 
Rome  and  Geneva).  Harley's  flatteries  gave  Swift  great 
satisfaction.  He  says  :  "  He  has  desired  to  dine  Avith  me. 
...  I  mean  he  has  desired  me  to  dine  Avith  him  on  Tues- 
day, and,  after  four  hours'  being  with  him,  set  me  down  at 
St.  James's  coffee-house  in  a  hackney-coach.  All  this  is 
odd  and  comical,  if  you  consider  him  and  me.  He  knew 
my  Christian  name  very  well  ;"  and  Oct.  14,  1710  (three 
days  later)  :  "  I  stand  with  the  new  people  ten  times  bet- 
ter than  ever  I  did  with  the  old,  and  forty  times  more 
caressed."  Consequently  Swift  went  over  to  the  "new 
people,"  and  he  Avas  of  infinite  service  to  them.  Of  his 
ability  it  is  hard  to  speak  too  highly,  and  his  change  of 
party  by  no  means  implies  moral  worthlessness.  Such 
a  change  nowadays  is  commonly  understood.  Mr.  Glad- 
stone, for  instance,  is  by  no   means   a   type   of  the    im- 


Jiiiylish  Literature.  211 

moral  renegade,  yet  his  position  at  present  is  in  direct  op- 
position to  that  which  he  took  on  entering  public  life,  yet 
we  can  see  and  respect  the  steps  by  which  he  changed  his 
views.  We  can  also  see  and  watch  Swift's,  in  his  state- 
ment :  "  They  call  me  nothing  but  Jonathan  ;  and  I  said 
I  believed  they  would  leave  me  Jonathan  as  they  found 
me,  and  that  I  never  knew  a  ministry  do  anything  for 
tliose  whom  they  make  companions  of  their  pleasures  : 
and  I  believe  you  will  find  it  so  ;  but  I  cannot."  What 
he  wanted  is  definitely  stated,  and  his  life  was  embittered 
by  his  failure,  although  his  friends  did  their  best  for  him, 
but  in  vain.  I  do  not  care  to  sit  in  judgment  on  Swift's 
political  changes.  I  wish  merely  to  show  the  relations  be- 
tween writers  and  politicians  at  this  time.  Each  side,  in 
making  a  bargain,  naturally  tried  to  make  the  best  bargain 
it  could.  There  is,  of  course,  no  reason  why  a  man  of  let- 
ters should  be  averse  to  putting  his  pen  to  political  writ- 
ing— and  in  many  ways  at  this  time  it  was  of  service  by 
securing  free  discussion — but  on  literature  the  effect  was 
not  so  unmistakably  beneficial.  Authors  had  to  be  obse- 
quious to  the  political  leaders,  and  they  were  continually 
bringing  themselves  into  notice  by  dedicating  their  works 
to  those  in  authority.*  Halifax,  Bolingbroke,  Godolphin, 
the  Duke    of   Ormond,  when   in  power,  received  dedica- 


*  Cf.  Schiller's  dedication  of  "  Dom  Karlos ;"  vide  "  Thalia,"  vol.  i.  (1*787) : 

"  DrRCHi,AUCHTir,STER  Hkrzog  : 

"  Gniidigster  Herr, — Unvergesslich  bleibt  itiir  der  Abend  wo  Eiire  ITer- 
zogliche  Durchlaucht  Sich  gnadigst  herabliessen,  dein  unvollkommenen 
Versuch  meiner  dramatischen  Muse,  diesem  ersten  Akt  Dom  Karlos,  einige 
unschatzbare  Augenblicke  zu  schenken,  Theilnehmer  der  Gefiihle  zu 
werden,  in  die  ich  mich  wagte,  Richter  eines  Gemahldes  zu  sein  das  ieh 
vou  Ihres  Gleichen  zu  unterwerfen  mir  erlaubte,"  etc. 

Corneille  dedicated  his  "  Cinna  "  to  a  M.  de  Montauron  for  one  thousand 
pistoles  (Guizot,  "Corneille,"  p.  181). 


212  English  Literatiwe. 

tions  as  one  nowadays  receives  Cliristmas  cards.  The  first 
volume  of  the  Spectator  was  dedicated  to  Somers  ;  the 
second,  to  Halifax  ;  the  third,  to  Henry  Boyle  ;  the  fourth, 
to  Marlborough  ;  the  fifth,  to  Earl  Wharton  ;  the  sixth, 
to  the  Earl  of  Sunderland  ;  the  seventh,  to  Mr.  Methuen, 
English  ambassador  at  the  court  of  Savoy.  These  dedi- 
cations are  not  so  cringing  as  some  in  the  previous  cen- 
tury, but  they  are  very  fulsome.  Young,  in  his  matui-er 
years,  excised  from  the  later  reprints  of  his  poems  the 
dedications  he  had  written  when  he  began  his  literary  ca- 
reer. Pope,  too,  who  denounced  the  habit  warmly  in  his 
"  Epistle  to  Dr.  Arbuthnot,"  wrote  in  these  terms  about 
Halifax  : 

"  Proud  as  Apollo  on  his  forked  hill, 
Sat  full-blown  Bufo,  puffed  by  every  quill ; 
Fed  with  soft  dedication  all  day  long, 
Horace  and  he  went  hand  in  hand  in  song." 

Thus,  in  a  "  Letter  from  Italy,"  Addison  spoke  to  him  of 
*'  lines  like  Virgil's  or  like  yours."    And  Congreve  wrote: 

"  0  had  your  Genius  been  to  Leisure  l^orn, 
And  not  more  bound  to  aid  us  than  adorn ! 
-Albion  in  verse  with  ancient  Greece  had  vied, 
And  gained  alone  a  fame,  which,  then,  seven  States  divide." 

Pope  himself  said  of  him,  in  his  preface  to  the  translation 
of  Homer,  "  of  whom  it  is  hard  to  say  whether  the  ad- 
vancement of  the  polite  arts  is  more  owing  to  his  gen- 
erosity or  his  example."     Pope  goes  on  : 

"  His  library  (where  busts  of  poets  dead 
And  a  true  Pindar  stood  without  a  head) 
Received  of  wits  an  undistinguished  race, 
Wlio  first  his  judgment  asked,  and  then  a  place : 
Much  they  extolled  his  pictures,  much  his  seat, 
And  flattered  every  day,  and  some  days  eat : 
Till  grown  more  frugal  in  his  riper  days, 
He  paid  some  bards  with  port  and  some  with  praise." 


English  Literature.  213 

Yet,  while  Pope  *  did  rap  what  was  a  great  fault,  we 
must  not  take  these  dedications  too  literally  ;  we  should 
set  down  part  of  their  language  to  mere  formality,  like 
that  which  is  used  in  the  ending  of  a  letter,  where  one 
man  calls  himself  the  obedient  servant  of,  it  may  be,  his 
deadliest  enemy. 

Another  misfortune  of  this  dependence  of  the  writers 
on  the  government  was  this,  that  much  of  their  time  was 
taken  up  in  work  that  could  have  been  as  well  performed 
by  some  one  else  equally  well.  Possibly,  however,  this  was 
better  than  starving  to  death,  which,  as  we  shall  soon  see, 
was  the  ever-ready  alternative.  Then,  too,  ministries  went 
out  and  new  parties  went  in,  so  that,  although  dancing  at- 
tendance on  ministers  kept  Swift  from  literature  for  four- 
teen years,  the  interval  between  the  "  Tale  of  a  Tub  "  and 
"  Gulliver,"  the  enforced  leisure  which  Addison  enjoyed 
gave  him  an  opportunity  to  write  the  Spectator.  A  more 
serious  matter  was  the  way  in  which  even  a  man  like  Swift 
could  be  forced  to  bend  his  neck  to  the  yoke  to  taste  the 
sweets  of  flattery  and  power,  and  then  be  dismissed  to  live 
and  die  in  Ireland,  "  like  a  poisoned  rat  in  a  hole,"  as  he 
said. 

With  the  advent  of  the  ministry  of  Sir  Robert  Wal- 
pole,  in  1721,  the  Augustan  age  of  literature  ceased,  and 
those  who  wrote  for  a  living  dropped  from  the  company 
of  courtiers  to  the  gutter,  one  may  say  almost  without 
exaggeration.  George  the  Second,  like  the  rest  of  the 
Hanoverian  kings,  cared  nothing  for  literature,  and  his 
minister  was  very  indifferent  to  it,  and  when  he  came  into 
power  he  had  already  condemned  literary  men  as  practi- 
cal politicians,  very  much  as  they  have  been  condemned 
in  this  country  in  more  recent  times.  Whatever  writing 
he  wanted  done  was  intrusted  to  low  scribblers,  and  that 

*  And  cf.  Pope  ngnin  in  the  (luardia?},  No.  4. 


214  English  Literature. 

was  not  a  great  deal.     With  his  accession  to  power,  gov- 
ernment patronage  ceased.     It  was  not  that  one  side  went 
in  when  the  other  went  out  :    they  were  all  outs.     The 
literature  of  the  last  century  is  full  of  references  to  the 
direful  effects  this  change  had  on  the   fortunes  of  au- 
thors.     Swift   ("To  Mr.  Gay,"  1731)    calls   him  "Bob, 
the  poet's  foe."     But,  in  general,  the  old  arts  of  fascinat- 
ing the  great  were  tried  on  him,  though  without  success. 
Savage,  whose  life  was  full  of  misery,  after  squandering 
whatever  money  he  was  able  to  get,  published  a  panegyric 
on  Sir  Robert  Walpole,  for  which  he  received  the  sum  of 
twenty  guineas;  but  that  was  a  singular  exception,  mod- 
erate as  the  gift  was.     His  friends,  too,  solicited  Walpole 
for  the  promise  of  the  next  place,  not  exceeding  £200  a 
year,  that  should  become  vacant.     The  promise  was  made, 
with  the  statement  that  "  it  was  not  the  promise  of  a 
minister  to  a  petitioner,  but  of  a  friend  to  his  friend." 
Yet  the  promise,  whatever  it  might  be  called,  was  never 
kept.      Savage   tried   writing  a   poem   in    honor   of   the 
Prince,  but  nothing  came  of  it.      The   Queen,  however, 
gave  him  a  pension  of  £50  a  year,  which  ceased  at  her 
death.     These  few  lines  from  Dr.  Johnson's  life  of  him, 
which  may  well  be  read  for  the  light  it  throws  on  the  con- 
dition of  literary  men  at  that  time,  show  to  what  stress 
writers  were  sometimes  driven,  though  this  abject  penurv 
was  in  great  measure  Savage's  own  fault:   "  He  lodged  as 
much  by  accident  as  he  dined,  and  ])assed  the  night  some- 
times in  mean  houses  which  are  set  open  at  night  to  anv 
casual   wanderers,  sometimes  in   cellars,  among  the  riot 
and  tilth  of  the  meanest  and  most  profligate  of  the  rabble, 
and  sometimes,  when  he  had  not  money  to  support  even 
the  expenses  of  these  rece]»tacles,  walked  about  the  streets 
till  he  was  weary,  and  lay  down  in  the  summer  upon  the 
bulk,   or   in   tlie   winter,    Mifji    jijs   associates   in    j^overtv, 


English  Literature.  215 

among  the  ashes  of  a  glass-house."  During  a  considerable 
part  of  the  time  in  which  he  was  writing  "Sir  Thomas 
Overbury,"  "  he  was  without  lodging  and  often  without 
meat  ;  nor  had  he  any  other  conveniences  for  study  than 
the  fields  or  the  streets  allowed  him  ;  there  he  used  to 
walk  and  form  his  speeches,  and  afterwards  walk  into  a 
shop,  beg  for  a  few  moments  the  use  of  the  pen  and  ink, 
and  write  down  what  he  had  composed  upon  paper  which 
he  had  picked  up  by  accident."  To  be  sure,  Savage's 
habits  were  such  as  at  any  period  of  the  world's  history 
would  have  brought  him  to  such  straits,  but  his  was  not 
an  exceptional  fate.  Steele,  Avho,  to  be  sure,  was  ncA'er  a 
model  of  economy,  died  in  want  and  obscurity  in  1720. 
Savage,  Steele,  and  Ambrose  Philips  were  walking  to- 
gether one  evening,  when  they  were  met  by  a  man  who 
told  them  there  were  some  suspicious-looking  fellows  in 
Avaiting  at  the  end  of  the  street,  probably  bailiffs,  and 
urged  any  one  who  might  have  business  with  them  to  go 
home  by  some  other  way.     They  all  turned  and  ran. 

Or  take  Thomson's  life  as  that  of  a  man  who  found  pa- 
trons. He  came  to  London,  but  his  pocket  was  at  once 
picked  and  his  letters  of  introduction  stolen.  The  blame 
for  that,  however,  cannot  be  justly  put  on  Sir  Robert 
Walpole.  He  sold  the  manuscript  of  his  "Winter"  to 
buy  a  pair  of  shoes.  It  was  dedicated  to  Sir  Spencer 
Compton,  whom  he  aftei-wards  visited  by  request.  He 
Avritcs  of  this  visit  :  "  He  received  me  in  what  they 
commonly  call  a  civil  manner ;  asked  me  some  com- 
monplace questions  ;  and  made  me  a  present  of  twenty 
guineas." 

"  Spring  "  was  dedicated  to  the  Countess  of  Hertford, 
"whose  practice  it  was  to  invite  every  summer  some  poet 
into  the  country,  to  hear  her  verses  and  assist  her  studies. 
This  honor  was  one  summer  conferred  on  Thomson,  who 


2i6  English  Literature. 

took  more  delight  in  carousing  with  Lord  Hertford  and 
his  friends  than  assisting  her  ladyship's  poetical  opera- 
tions, and  therefore  never  received  another  summons." 
He  afterwards  travelled  on  the  Continent  with  a  pupil ;  on 
his  return,  he  was  given  the  place  of  secretary  of  the  briefs, 
and  composed  an  unreadable  poem  on  "Liberty  ;"  but  his 
patron  soon  died.  However,  he  was  given  a  small  pension, 
£100,  and  managed  to  be  put  into  another  office.* 

Less  successful  was  Johnson's  friend,  Mr.  Boyse,  who 
lay  in  bed  because  his  clothes  were  in  pawn.f  Johnson 
collected  enough,  by  separate  sixpences,  to  get  them  out, 
and  in  two  days  they  were  back.  Once  he  was  nearly  starv- 
ing, and  "  some  money  was  produced  to  purchase  him  a 
dinner,  he  got  a  bit  of  roast  beef,  but  could  not  eat  it  with- 
out catchup,  and  laid  out  the  last  half -guinea  he  possessed 
in  truffles  and  mushrooms,  eating  them  in  bed,  too,  for 
want  of  clothes,  or  even  a  shirt  to  sit  up  in." 

The  refining  influence  of  letters  may  be  gathered  from 
this  anecdote  :  "  Another  man  ,  .  .  made  as  wild  use  of 
his  friend's  beneficence,  .  .  .  spending  in  punch  the  soli- 
tary guinea  which  had  been  brought  him  one  morning  ; 
when  resolving  to  add  another  claimant  to  a  share  of  the 
bowl,  besides  a  woman  who  always  lived  with  him,  and  a 
footman  who  used  to  carry  out  petitions  for  charity,  he 
borrowed  a  chairman's  watch,  and  pawning  it  for  half-a- 
crown,  paid  a  clergyman  to  marry  him  to  a  fellow-lodger 
in  the  wretched  house  they  all  inhabited,  and  got  so  drunk 
over  the  guinea  boAvl  of  punch  the  evening  of  his  wedding- 
day,  that  having  many  years  lost  the  use  of  one  leg,  he 
now  contrived  to  fall  from  the  top  of  the  stairs  to  the 

*  This  was  when  the  Prince  of  Wales  was  in  the  opposition,  and  with  a 
small  puTse  made  an  attempt  to  collect  adherents  among  literary  men. 
Mallet  also  got  a  pension. 

f  V\de  Life  in  Anderson's  "  Poets,"  x.  329. 


En<jluh  Literature.  217 

bottom,  find  break  his  arm."  In  this  condition  Johnson 
brought  him  relief. 

Johnson,  too,  had  himself  known  what  were  the  diffi- 
culties in  the  way  of  the  young  author,  for  he  and  Savage 
were  sometimes  so  poor  that  they  could  not  pay  for  a 
lodging,  and  had  wandered  together  whole  nights  in  the 
streets.  One  night  in  particular,  he  and  Savage  strolled 
about  inveighing  against  the  minister,  and  resolved  they 
would  stand  by  their  country. 

As  these  are  well-attested  historical  facts,  we  can  un- 
derstand the  allusions  in  the  novelists  to  the  wn'etchedness 
of  authors. 

In  "  Humphrey  Clinker,"  Smollett  gives  an  account  of 
a  collection  of  authors,  who  met  on  Sunday,  the  only  day 
they  were  safe  from  arrest,  at  the  house  of  one  S.,  who  wel- 
comed them  to  his  table.  They  were  men  who  had  trans- 
lated, collated,  and  compiled  for  more  reputable  authors, 
and  had  now  set  up  for  themselves.  The  most  learned 
had  been  expelled  the  university  for  atheism,  had  prepared 
an  orthodox  confutation  of  Lord  Bolingbroke,  but  had 
been  meanwhile  presented  to  the  grand  jury  as  a  public 
nuisance  for  blaspheming  in  an  alehouse  on  the  Lord's 
day.  A  Scotchman  was  there  who  gave  lectures  on  the 
pronunciation  of  the  English  language.  There  was  a 
Piedmontese  who  wrote  a  humorous  satire  on  the  "  Bal- 
ance of  the  English  Poets."  A  sage  who  labored  under 
the  ny(jo(j>olna  had  written  on  agriculture,  though  he  did 
not  know  hominy  from  rice.*  Another  Cockney,  who 
had  never  left  London,  was  engaged  in  writing  his  trav- 
els through  Europe  and  a  part  of  Asia,  etc.,  etc.  Field- 
ing, in  his  "Joseph  Andrews"  (lib.  iii.  chap,  iii.),  gives 
an  account  of  the  miseries  of  a  poor  author  :  "  Many  a 
morning  have  I  waited  in  the  cold  parlours  of  men  of 

*  Vide  "Notes  and  Qneiies,"  July  6,  ]8(il,  p.  7. 
10 


2i8  JEnglish  Literature. 

quality  ;  when  after  seeing  the  lowest  rascals  in  lace  and 
embroidery  .  ,  ,  admitted,  I  have  been  sometimes  told, 
on  sending  in  my  name,  that  my  lord  could  not  possibly 
see  me  this  morning.  .  .  .  The  profits  which  booksellers 
allowed  authors  for  the  best  work  was  so  very  small,  that 
certain  men  of  birth  and  fortune  some  years  ago,  who 
were  the  patrons  of  wit  and  learning,  thought  fit  to  en- 
courage them  further  by  entering  into  voluntary  subscrip- 
tions for  their  encouragement.  Thus  Prior,  Rowe,  Pope, 
and  some  other  men  of  genius  received  large  sums  for 
their  labours  from  the  public.  This  seemed  so  easy  a 
method  of  getting  money,  that  many  of  the  lowest  scrib- 
blers of  the  times  ventured  to  publish  their  works  in  the 
same  way  ;  and  many  had  the  assurance  to  take  in  sub- 
scriptions for  what  was  not  writ  and  never  intended." 
Mallet  (whose  name  was  changed  by  himself  from  Mal- 
loch )  for  a  long  time  assumed  to  be  writing  a  life  of 
the  Duke  of  Marlborough  ;  as  a  reward,  the  Duchess  left 
him  £1000,  and  he  also  had  for  the  same  reason  a  pension 
from  the  family,  but  he  had  not  written  a  line.  The  pa- 
pers had  before  this  been  intrusted  to  Steele,  who  had 
pawned  them.  Boswell  quotes  Dr.  Johnson's  mention  of 
a  man  named  Cooke,*  who  translated  Ilesiod,  and  lived 
twenty  years  on  a  translation  of  Plautus,  for  which  he 
was  always  taking  subscriptions. 

Fielding's  Wilson  took  to  translating,  but  "  contracted 
a  distemper  by  my  sedentary  life,  in  which  no  part  of  my 
body  was  exercised  but  my  right  arm,  which  rendered 
ine  incapable  of  writing  for  a  long  time."  Smollett  men- 
tions an  author  who,  on  the  pretext  of  meaning  to  make  a 
short  journey,  borrowed  a  horse,  which  he  at  once  sold, 

♦  It  was  this  Cooke  who  introduced  Foote  to  a  chib  in  these  words  : 
"  This  is  the  nephew  of  the  gentleman  who  was  lately  hung  in  chains  for 
murdering  his  brother." 


■  English  Literature.  219 

and,  in  addition,  stole  his  publisher's  boots.  As  for  Sav- 
age, it  is  told  of  Lord  Tyrconnel,  when  Savage  was  living 
with  him,  that,  "having  given  him  a  collection  of  valu- 
able books,  stamped  with  his  own  arms,  he  had  the  mor- 
tification to  see  them  in  a  short  time  exj^osed  to  sale 
upon  the  stalls,  it  being  usual  with  Mr.  Savage,  when  he 
wanted  a  small  sum,  to  take  his  books  to  the  j^awnbroker." 
He  was  continually  getting  subscribers  for  new  editions 
of  his  writings,  which  were  never  printed.  The  transla- 
tors were  the  lowest  of  all,  as  Fielding  implies.  One,  who 
undertook  a  translation  of  Lucretius,  wrote  out  a  new  ver- 
sion of  the  first  page,  and  then  copied  all  the  rest  from  a 
published  work. 

How  different  all  this  crapulous  misery  is  from  the  con- 
dition of  things  in  the  beginning  of  the  cenfufy^s^'Sry'' 
clear.  Then  a  writer  held  a  high  social  position,  and 
afterwards  he  sank  low,  until,  in  the  course  of  time,  he 
managed  to  get  into  relations  directly  with  the  public. 
We  shall  see  later  how  this  happened. 

That  literature  should  have  been  looked  upon  as  a  dis- 
graceful profession  is  not,  under  the  circumstances,  sur- 
prising. Even  in  the  older  times,  Congreve  had  affected 
to  despise  his  literary  success.  Voltaire,  who  was  anxious 
to  see  everything  and  every  one,  made  him  a  visit,  and 
spoke  about  the  Englishman's  plays,  but  Congreve  treated 
them  as  trifles,  and  asked  his  visitor  not  to  speak  of  them-. 
"  Sir,"  said  Voltaire,  "  if  you  had  the  misfortune  of  being 
nothing  but  a  gentleman,  I  should  never  have  come  to  see 
you."  But  now  literature  was  despised  for  very  different 
and  more  respectable  reasons.  Society  could  hardly  be 
expected  to  smile  on  Savage,  for  instance,  who,  "  if  he  was 
entertained  by  a  family,  nothing  was  any  longer  to  be  re- 
garded there  but  amusement  and  jollity."  "  He  was  an 
incommodious  inmate;  for,  being  accustomed  to  an  irregu- 


220  English  Literature. 

lar  life,  be  could  not  confine  himself  to  any  stated  hours, 
or  pay  any  regard  to  the  rules  of  a  family,  but  could  pro- 
long his  conversation  till  midnight,  without  considering 
that  business  might  require  his  friend's  application  in  the 
morning  ;  and  when  he  had  persuaded  himself  to  retire  to 
bed,  was  not,  without  equal  difftculty,  called  up  to  dinner  : 
it  was  therefore  impossible  to  pay  him  any  distinction 
without  the  entire  subversion  of  all  economy,  a  kind  of 
establishment  which,  whercA^er  he  went,  he  always  ap- 
peared ambitious  to  overthrow."  This  is,  of  course,  an 
exceptional  case,  such  as  might  happen  nowadays,  and 
does  happen  every  night  of  the  week.  Horace  Walpole 
was  very  unwilling  to  be  looked  on  as  a  man  of  letters. 
As  Macaulay  said,  "  he  did  not  like  to  have  anything  in 
common  with  the  wretches  who  lodged  in  the  little  courts 
behind  St.  Martin's  Church,  and  stole  out  on  Sunday  to 
dine  Avith  their  bookseller."  When  Mann  congratulated 
him  on  the  learning  shown  in  his  "  Catalogue  of  Royal 
and  Noble  Authors,"  Walpole  wrote  :  "I  know  nothing. 
How  should  I  ?  I  who  have  always  lived  in  the  big  busy 
world  ;  who  lie  abed  all  the  morning,  calling  it  morning 
as  long  as  you  please  ;  who  sup  in  company  ;  who  have 
flayed  at  faro  half  my  life,  and  now  at  loo  till  two  or 
three  in  the  morning  ;  who  have  always  loved  pleasure  ; 
haunted  auctions.  .  .  .  How  I  have  laughed  when  some 
of  the  magazines  have  called  me  the  learned  gentleman. 
Pray  don't  be  like  the  magazines."  But  Horace  Wal- 
pole was  a  very  genteel  person,  who  did  not  represent  the 
whole  view  of  society.  His  letters  are  full  of  contemptu- 
ous references  to  most  of  the  writers  of  his  time,  viz.:  "•  I 
had  rather  have  written  the  most  absurd  lines  in  Lee,  than 
'  Leonidas  '  or  the  '  Seasons.'  "  "  The  third  and  fourth 
volumes  of  '  Tristram  Shandy  '  are  the  dregs  of  nonsense, 
and  have  universally  met  the  contempt  they  deserve."    In 


Ehgl'ish  Lite  mill  re.  221 

short,  he  was  an  hidustrious  dilettante  who  should  be  liv- 
ine:  now  in  the  present  a^^e  of  testheticisni. 

The_jeJutions^of  Popje  to  the  public  need  to  be  studied 
carefully,  for  while,  when  he  began  to  write,  government 
encouragement  of  literature  was  at  its  height,  he  outlived 
th^t,  and  saw  most  of  the  contemporaries  of  his  later  years 
in  the  mi:^ery  I  have  described.  The  fact  that  he  be- 
longed to  the  Church  of  Rome  stood  in  the  way  of  his 
holding  a  position  under  government.  The  laws  against 
Papists  were  very  severe  at  that  time.  Thus  ("  Lecky," 
i.  298,  etc.)  :  "An  act  was  passed  in  1699,  by  which  any 
Catholic  priest  convicted  of  celebrating  mass,  or  discharg- 
ing any  sacerdotal  function  {except  in  the  house  of  an 
ambassador),  was  made  liable  U)  perpetual  imprisonment,"  * 
and  a  reward  of  £1000  was  offered  for  conviction.  The 
same  punishment  vras  to  be  hiflicted  on  any  Papist  who 
kept  school  or  undertook  the  education  of  the  young.  No 
parent  could  send  a  child  abroad  to  be  educated  in  the 
Catholic  faith,  under  a  penalty  of  £100,  which  went  to  the 
informer.  "  All  persons  who  did  not,  within  six  months 
of  attaining  the  age  of  eighteen,  take  the  Oath,  not  only 
of  Allegiance,  but  also  of  Suprenuicy,  and  subscribe  the 
declaration  against  transubstantiation,  became  incapable 
of  either  inheriting  or  purchasing  land,  and  the  property 
they  would  otherwise  have  inherited  passed  to  the  next 
Protestant  heir."  All  persons  in  any  civil  or  military 
office,  all  members  of  colleges,  teachers,  preachers,  law- 
yers of  every  grade,  were  compelled  to  take  the  Oath 
of  Supremacy,  which  was  distinctly  anti-Catholic,  as  well 
as  the  Oath  of  Allegiance  and  the  declaration  against 
the  Stuarts.  At  any  time  the  oath  could  be  required  of 
any  Catholic  who  was  suspected  of  disaffection.  Who- 
ever refused  was  debarred  from  appearing  at  court,  or 

*  Leckj's  "  liistory  of  the  Eiglitefiitli  Century,"  i.  298  et  seq. 


222  Engliish  Literature. 

* 
even  coming  within  ten  miles  of  London,  from  holding 

any  office  or  employment,  from  keeping  arms  in  his  house, 
from  travelling  more  than  five  miles  from  home  without 
special  license,  and  from  bringing  any  action  at  law  or 
suit  in  equity,  under  pain  of  forfeiting  all  his  goods. 

In  the  English  provinces,  Virginia  proscribed  Puritans 
and  Catholics  ;  Massachusetts  proscribed  and  persecuted 
Episcopalians  and  Quakers  ;  but  the  Quaker  provinces  and 
Rhode  Island  established  complete  religious  freedom,  and 
in  1632  Maryland,  founded  by  the  Cathohc  Lord  Balti- 
more, established  this  precedent  of  toleration,  limited, 
however,  to  believers  in  the  Trinity.  "  The  Protestants, 
however,  got  the  upper  hand,  and  in  1704  "  enslaved"  the 
Catholics. 

While  the  laws  in  England  were  thus  rigorous,  they 
were  seldom  put  into  effect ;  the  Catholics  in  fact  enjoyed 
toleration,  and  possibly,  as  Lecky  suggests,  the  fact  that  a 
Roman  Catholic  was  at  the  head  of  English  literature  may 
have  tended  towards  encouraging  milder  views.  Yet  there 
was  the  danger  that  the  laws  might  be  turned  against  Pope 
at  any  moment. 

As  he  said  ("  Imitation  of  Horace,"  lib.  ii.  ep.  ii.)  : 

^  "  Bred  up  at  home,  full  early  1  begun 

To  read  in  Greek  the  wrath  of  Peleus'  son. 
Besides,  my  father  taught  me,  from  a  lad. 
The  better  art  to  know  the  good  from  bad : 
(And  little  sure  imported  *  to  remove. 
To  hunt  for  truth  in  Maudlin's  learned  grove.) 
But  knottier  points,  we  knew  not  half  so  well, 
Deprived  us  soon  of  our  paternal  cell ; 
And  certain  laws,  by  sufferers  thought  unjust, 
Denied  all  posts  of  profit  or  of  trust : 
Hopes  after  hopes  of  pious  Papists  failed 

*  Peu  importait,  cf.  Dryden  ("  Marriage  a  la  Mode,"  iii.  1) :  "It  imports 
me  to  practise  what  I  shall  say  to  my  servant  when  I  meet  him." 


English  Literature.  223 

While  mighty  William's  thundering  arm  prevailed. 
For  right  hereditary  taxed  and  fined, 
He  stuck  to  poverty  with  peace  of  mind ; 
And  me  the  Muses  helped  to  undergo  it ; 
Convict  a  papist  he,  and  I  a  poet."  * 

Yet  Pope  was  essentially  a  man  of  letters  and  not  a 
politician.  Harley,  in  1714,  offered  him  a  place  under 
government  if  he  would  consent  to  change  his  religion  ; 
yet,  although  he  was  by  no  means  a  fervent  Catholic,  he 
declined  this  proposal,  one  reason  being  that  he  was  un- 
willing to  pain  his  parents.  Halifax,  possibly  with  a  view 
to  being  simg  by  Pope,  proposed  a  pension,  but  this  was 
declined,  as  was  a  similar  offer  from  Craggs  of  one  of  £300 
a  year  out  of  the  secret  funds. 

Certainly  these  things  should  be  remembered  to  Pope's 
credit,  especially  at  the  present  time,  when,  besides  being 
oi;t  of  favor  as  a  poet,  his  moral  character  has  been 
riddled  by  the  discoveries  of  those  who  have  made  a 
searching  examination  of  his  life,  writings,  and  papers. 
He  has  been  found  guilty  of  the  most  complicated  lying 
that  can  be  imagined,  and  he  stands  in  contrast  not  with 
living  men — many  of  whom  are  not  wholly  free  from  this 
vice,  which  is  encouraged  by  the  fact  that  it  makes  no 
difference  how  often  a  man  is  discovered  in  falsehood,  he 
is  eagerly  believed  the  next  time  he  perjures  himself — 
but  with  the  faultless  beings  whom  we  find  in  biogra- 
phies. 

As  soon  as  Pope  began  to  write  he  got  into  communi- 
cation with  Tonson,  the  publisher  of  Dryden's  "  Yirgil," 
and  it  was  in  a  volume  of  Tonson's  miscellanies  that 
Pope's  pastorals  appeared  in  1709.  There  was  this  advan- 
tage for  Pope,  that  Tonson  no  longer  enjoyed  a  monopoly; 
he  had  a  formidable  rival  in  Lintot.     These  two  men 

*  As  if  these  were  equal  faults  in  the  eyes  of  the  government. 


224  EiKjllsh  Literature. 

pushed  each  other  hard.  Tonson  published  Shakspere's 
plays,  Lmtot  brought  out  his  poems.  Lintot  announced 
Pope's  translation  of  the  *'  Iliad,"  Tonson  offered  the 
"  First  Book,"  translated  by  Tickell.  They  both  wrote 
to  Young  to  secure  his  work,  and  in  answering  their  let- 
ters he  misdirected  them,  so  that  the  one  to  Tonson  fell 
into  Lintot's  hands,  and  vice  versa.  The  matter  was  com- 
plicated by  the  fact  that  the  one  sent  to  Lintot,  but 
written  for  Tonson,  began  :  "That  Bernard  Lintot  is  so 
great  a  scoundrel,  that,"  etc. 

Pope's  "  Pastorals  "  *  have  scarcely  sufficient   literary 

*  Pope  was  recommended  to  write  tlie  fourth  pastoral  by  William 
"Walsh,  a  faniotis  critic  of  the  time  (1663-170S).  lie  it  was  who  urtred 
Pope  to  try  to  be  a  correct  poet.  He  had  been  recommended  to  the  pub- 
lic by  Dryden,  who  said  he  was  the  best  critic  in  the  nation ;  and  Pope 
wrote  of  him  : 

'•  To  him  the  wit  of  Greece  and  Rome  was  known, 

And  every  author's  merit  but  his  own  ; 

Such  late  was  Walsh — the  Muses'  judge  and  friend, 

Who  justly  knew  to  blame  or  to  commend  ; 

To  failings  mild,  but  zealous  to  desert. 

The  clearest  head  and  the  sincerest  heart." 

Walsh  is  one  of  the  few  men  who  wrote  sonnets  in  English  between 
Milton  and  the  Wartons  (al»out  ITriO): 

"  What  has  this  bugbear  Death  that's  worth  our  care '? 

After  a  life  of  pain  and  sorrow  past, 
After  deluding  hopes  and  dire  despair, 

Death  only  gives  us  quiet  at  the  last  ; 

How  strangely  are  our  love  and  hate  misplaced  ! 
Freedom  we  seek  and  yet  from  freedom  tlee, 

Courting  those  tyrant  sins  that  chain  us  fast  ; 
And  shunning  death  that  only  sets  us  free. 
'Tis  not  a  foolish  fear  of  future  pains, — 
■\Vliy  should  they  fear  who  keep  then-  souls  from  stains? 

Tiiat  makes  me  dread  thy  terrors.  Death,  to  see ; 
Tis  i:ot  the  loss  of  riches  or  of  fame, 


Eiiyli/sh  Literature.  225 

merit  to  detain  us  long.  Lines  like  these  cannot  move  us 
now  : 

"  Hear  how  the  bu'ds,  on  every  blooming  spray, 
Witli  joyous  music  walie  the  dawning  day  ! 
Why  sit  we  mute,  when  early  linnets  sing, 
When  warbling  Philomel  salutes  the  spring? 
Why  sit  we  sad  when  Phosphor  shines  so  clear. 
And  lavish  nature  paints  the  purple  year?" 

Or  these  : 

"  All  nature  mourns,  the  skies  relent  in  showers, 
Hush'd  are  the  birds,  and  closed  the  drooping  flowers; 
If  Delia  smile,  the  flowers  begin  to  spring, 
The  sides  to  brighten,  and  the  birds  to  sing." 

It  is  sufficiently  clear  that  these  lines — and  they  are  fairly 
representative  of  the  whole — are  but  a  faded  transcript 
of  some  old  pattern.  They  show  the  smooth  copying  of 
some  other  original  rather  than  genuine  love  of  the  coun- 
try or  real  passion  : 

"  F'or  her  the  flocks  refuse  their  verdant  food. 
The  thirsty  heifers  shun  the  gliding  flood. 
The  silver  swans  her  hapless  fate  bemoan 
In  notes  more  sad  than  when  tliey  sing  their  own  ; 
In  lioUow  caves  sweet  echo  silent  lies 
Silent,  or  only  to  her  name  replies," 

All  this  is  as  truly  sham  sentiment  as  it  is  faulty  nat- 
ural history.  It  is  part  of  the  pastoral  poetry  of  which 
mention  was  made  above.  It  had  its  origin  in  the  re- 
action of  modern  life  against  the  Middle  Ages,  in  the 
negation  of  chivalry,  mysticism,  and  asceticism  which 
distinguished  the  Renaissance,*  and  the  struggle  of  the 

Or  the  vain  toys  the  vulgar  pleasures  nnine, 
'Tis  nothing,  Celia,  but  the  losing  thee!" 
It  is  the  last  line,  witli  its  smirk  and  bow  to  Celia,  that  betrays  the  date  of 
composition. 

*  Vide  Symond's  "  Renaissance  in  Italy,"  v.  245. 

10* 


226  Enijllfih  Literature. 

southern  races,  with  their  love  of  clearness,  against  the 
murky  emotions  of  northern  Europe.  In  Italy,  as  we 
have  seen,  the  movement,  after  bearing  fruit  in  a  number 
of  poems  in  Latin  and  Italian,  and  flowering  in  the  pas- 
toral dramas  of  "  Aminta  "  and  the  "  Pastor  Fido,"  faded 
away  into  the  Areadias  of  the  last  century,  and  the  Italian 
opera.  From  Italy,  as  we  saw,  they  passed  through  the 
rest  of  Europe  ;  even  Cervantes  wrote  a  pastoral  novel, 
the  "  Galathea,"  and  the  pastoral  existed  for  a  long  time  as 
the  legitimate  expression,  artificial  as  it  seems  to  us,  of  the 
love  of  nature.  Real  nature  they  could  not  endure,  this 
artificial  copying  of  it  was  looked  upon  as  an  admirable 
form  of  literature.  In  English  literature,  we  find  the  earli- 
est traces  of  it  in  Sidney  and  Spenser.  Spenser's  "  Shep- 
herd's Calendar"  (15V9)  (the  name  was  applied  commonly 
to  a  sort  of  almanac,  with  recipes  and  astrological  notes 
suited  to  rustics)  consists  of  twelve  eclogues.*  "  ^Flglogai, 
as  it  were  aJywv  or  aiyoidjuwi'  Xoyoj,  that  is  (joatherd  s 
Tales,'  "  is  Edward  Kirke's  explanation  of  their  name. 
Spenser  really  said  something  in  this  way  ;  he  pretended 
to  be  a  shepherd,  calling  himself  Colin  Clout ;  f  Hobbinoll 
being  Gabriel  Harvey  ;  Cuddie,  possibly  Edward  Ivirke. 
These  were  real  names  ;  Hobbinoll,  for  instance,  in  a  note, 
is  called  "  common  and  usuall."  The  poems,  one  for  each 
month,  beginning  with  January,  are  on  different  subjects. 
Some  are  simply  love-poems;  three  or  four  others  are 
translations  from  Marot  or  imitations  ^f  Theocritus,  Bion, 
or  Vergil.  Two  contain  well-told  fables — the  "  Oak  and 
the  Briar,"  and  that  of  the  "  Fox  and  the  Kid,"  which  ex- 
presses the  dissatisfaction  of  the  populace  with  the  clergy, 

*  "This  being,  who  seeth  not  the  grossness  of  such  as  by  colour  of 
learning  would  make  us  believe,  that  they  are  more  rightly  tearmed  Ec- 
lo"-ai,  as  they  would  say,  extraordinarie  discourses  of  unnecessary  matter." 

f  From  Skelton  and  Clement  Marot. 


EngllaJt  Literature.  227 

and  the  suspicions  felt  concerning  Romish  intrigues  ;  and 
then  there  is,  of  course,  a  poem  in  honor  of  the  fair  Eliza." 
Two  "  are  burlesque  imitations  of  rustic  dialect  and  ban- 
ter." *  One  is  a  funeral  tribute  to  a  great  lady  ;  another 
is  a  complaint  of  the  way  in  which  poets  were  neglected 
by  the  great.  Three  of  them  abuse  the  misconduct  of  the 
clergy  and  denounce  Rome.  This  brief  description  will 
suffice  to  show  that  Spenser's  treatment  of  the  pastoral 
had  at  least  this  advantage,  that  it  was  used  to  convey 
something  to  the  reader  besides  ingenious  rhapsodies. 
After  his  time,  we  see  it  as  a  conventional  form  used 
by  many  poets,  as  in  Milton's  "  Lycidas,"  Congreve's 
poem  on  the  death  of  Queen  Mary,  and  even  Shelley's 
"  Adonais,"  and  Mr.  Arnold's  "Thyrsis."  As  Dr.  John- 
son said  (  "  Life  of  Ambrose  Philips  "  ),  "  there  had  never, 
from  the  time  of  Spenser,  wanted  writers  to  talk  occa- 
sionally of  Arcadia  and  Strephon."  Yet  this  is  not  a  pre- 
cise statement.  Later  writers  used  some  of  the  pastoral 
machinery,  to  be  sure,  and  Arcadia  became  as  truly  part 
of  the  classical  territory  as  the  region  of  that  name  was 
part  of  classical  geography,  and  Strephon  and  Doris  were 
its  inhabitants  ;  but  the  pastoral,  as  sung  by  alleged  shep- 
herds, did  not  exist  without  interruption,  and  it  was  ridi- 
culed by  certain  poets.  Marlowe  wrote  "  The  Shepherd 
to  his  Love,"  "  Come  Live  with  Me  and  Be  my  Love,"  f 
in  answer  .to  which  Raleigh  (?)  wrote  ("The  Milk-maid's 
Mother's  Answer  ")  the  "  Nymph's  Reply:" 

"  If  that  the  world  and  love  were  young, 
And  truth  in  every  shepherd's  tongue, 
These  pretty  pleasures  might  me  move 
To  live  with  thee  and  be  thy  love." 

*  Church's  "  Spenser,"  English  Men  of  Letters  Series. 

f  Reprinted  in  the  "Compleat  Angler,"'  1G5.3,  and  so  made  popular. 


228  jLnyl'ish  Litarature. 

Each  stanza  of  the  answer  ridiculed  the  corresponding 
one  of  the  original.  Marlowe's  poem  was  printed  in  the 
"Passionate  Pilgrim"  (1549) — i.  e.,  stanzas  1,  2,  3,  and  5. 
This  bore  only  Shakspere's  name  on  it  at  first,  but,  in  1600, 
Marlowe's.  It  was  very  popular,  and  was  imitated  by 
Donne  ("The  Bait"),  and  by  Herrick  ("To  Phillis  :  to 
Love  and  Live  with  Him").* 

Among  the  miscellaneous  poems  of  the  di'amatist  Robert 
Greene  (1550-92)  we  find  a  burlesque,  called  "  Doron's 
Eclogue,  joined  with  Carmela's." 

"  Doron.      Sit  down,  Carraela  ;  here  are  cobs  for  kings, 
Sloes  black  as  jet  or  like  my  Christmas  shoes, 
Sweet  cider,  which  my  leathern  bottle  brings ; 
Sit  down,  Carmela,  let  me  kiss  thy  toes. 

"  Carmela.  Ah  Doron  !  ah  my  heart !  thou  art  as  white 
As  is  my  mother's  calf  or  briiided  cow ; 
Thine  eyes  are  like  the  glow-worm  in  the  night; 
Thine  hairs  resemble  thickest  of  the  snow. 

"The  lines  within  thy  face  are  deep  and  clear 
Like  to  the  furrows  of  my  father's  wain,"  etc. 

Yet  this,  to  our  ears,  is  scarcely  more  absurd  than  Pope's 

*  Donne's  ran  thus  : 

"  Come  live  with  me  and  be  my  love, 

And  we  will  some  new  pleasures  prove 

Of  golden  sands  and  crystal  brooks, 

"With  silken  lines  and  silver  hooks. 
"  There  will  the  river  whispering  run 

Warm'd  by  thine  eyes  moi-e  than  the  sun  ; 

And  there  the  enamoured  fish  will  stay 

Begging  themselves  they  may  betray,"  etc. 
Herrick's  thus : 

"  Live,  live  with  me  and  thou  shalt  see 

The  pleasures  I'll  prepare  for  thee ; 

What  sweets  the  country  can  afford 

Shall  bless  thy  bed,  and  bless  thy  board." 


EiKjllsh  Literature.  229 

rehandling  of  the  pastoral.     By  a  singular  coincidence, 
Ambrose  Philips  also  composed  pastorals  ;  he  it  was  who 
became  immortalized  in  the  words  namby-pamby,  for  such 
.  lines  as  this: 

"  Dimply  damsel,  sweetlv  smiling."  * 

*  "  To   Miss    Margaret   Pulteney,  Daughter  of  Charles  Pulteiiey,  esq. 
April  27,  1727: 

"  Dimply  damsel,  sweetly  smiling, 
All  caressing,  none  beguiling. 
Bud  of  beauty,  fairly  blowing,"  etc. 

In  the  Gokkn  Treasury,  No.  csii.  p.  Ill,  is  his  poem  "To  Charlotte  Pul- 
teney,"  May  1, 1724  : 

"  Timely  blossom,  infant  fair. 
Fondling  of  a  happy  pair, 
Every  morn  and  every  night 
Their  solicitous  delight,"  etc. 
It  is  rather  pretty. 

Compare  Ambrose  Philips's  poems  to  the  Pulteney  children  with  Marot's 
"  Pour  la  Petite  Princesse  de  Xavarre,  a  Mme.  Marguerite:" 
"  Voyant  que  la  Royne,  ma  mere, 
Trouve  k  present,  la  ryiue  amere, 
Ma  dame,  m'est  prins  fantasie 
De  vous  monstrer  qu'en  poesie 
Sa  fille  suis.     Arriere  prose, 
Puis  que  renier  maintenaut  j'ose. 
"  Pour  commencer  done  a  renier  : 
Vous  pouvez,  ma  dame,  estimer 
Quel  joye  a  la  fille  advenoit, 
Sachant  que  la  mere  venoit,"  etc. 

D'He'ricault's  ed.,  p.  85. 
And  with  Ronsard,  "  Gayete,"  No.  vii.  (ed.  Blanchemaui,  vi.  396) : 
"  Enfant  de  quatre  ans,  combien 
Ta  politesse  a  de  bleu  ! 
Combien  en  a  ton  enfance 
Si  elle  avoit  cognoissance 
De  I'heur  que  je  dois  avoir 
Et  qu'elle  a  sans  le  scavoir,"  etc. 
Lamb  says  ("Works,"  iii.  178):  "To  the  measure  in  which  these  lines 


230  EnglinJi  Literature. 

It  was  applied  to  him  by  Henry  Carey  *  (author  of  "  Sally 
in  Our  Alley,"  and  "  Chrononhotonthologos  ").  That  two 
men  should  at  the  same  time  try  their  hand  at  this  species 

are  written  the  wits  of  Queen  Anne's  days  contemptuously  gave  the 
name  of  Namby  Pamby,  in  ridicule  of  Ambrose  Philips,  who  has  used  it  in 
some  instances,  as  in  the  lines  on  Cuzzoni,  to  ray  feeling  at  least,  very  de- 
liciously;  but  \Yithcr,  whose  darling  measure  it  seems  to  have  been,  may 
show  that  in  skilful  hands  it  is  capable  of  expressing  the  subtilest  move- 
ments of  passion.  So  true  it  is,  which  Drayton  seems  to  have  felt,  that  it 
is  the  poet  who  modifies  the  metre,  not  the  metre  the  poet."  Tliese  are 
the  lines  "  To  Signora  Cuzzoni  "  to  which  Lamb  refers : 
"  Little  syren  of  the  stage, 

Charmer  of  an  idle  age ; 

Empty  warbler,  breathing  lyre. 

Wanton  gale  of  fond  desire, 

Bane  of  every  manly  art, 

Sweet  enfeebler  of  the  heart! 

0,  too  pleasing  in  thy  strain. 

Hence  to  southern  climes  again ; 

Tuneful  mischief,  vocal  spell, 

To  this  island  bid  farewell ; 

Leave  us  as  we  ought  to  be. 

Leave  the  Britons  rough  and  free." 

*  Henry  Carey :  "  He  led  a  life  free  from  reproach,  and  hanged  himself 
Oct.  4,  1743."  In  his  poems  (3d  ed.,  1729,  p.  55)  we  find  "  Namby-Pamby ; 
or  a  Panegyric  of  the  New  Versification :" 

"  All  ye  poets  of  the  age ! 
All  ye  witlings  of  the  stage, 
Learn  your  jingles  to  reform, 
Crop  your  numbers  and  conform  : 
Let  your  little  verses  flow 
Gently,  sweetly,  row  by  row. 
Let  the  verse  the  subject  lit, 
Little  subject,  little  wit, 
Nam  by-Pa  m  by  is  your  guide 
Albion's  joy,  Ilibernia's  pride. 

*  *  *  * 

Now  the  venal  poet  sings 


English  Literature.  231 

of  composition  is,  perhaps,  a  little  strange,  unless  we  re- 
member that  it  was,  so  to  speak,  awaiting  the  writers  of 
the  day.  It  gave  pleasure,  however,  to  readers  ;  for  the 
Arcadia  it  described  was,  after  all,  a  relief  from  the 
intellectual  and  didactic  region  towards  which  poetry 
was  moving.  As  Steele  said  in  the  Guardian,  No.  22  : 
"It  transports  us  into  a  kind  of  fairy -land,  where  our 
ears  are  soothed  with  the  melody  of  birds,  bleating  flocks, 
and  purling  streams  ;  our  eyes  enchanted  with  flowery 
meadows  and  springing  greens  ;  we  are  laid  under  cool 
shades,  and  entertained  with  all  the  sweets  and  freshness 
of  nature.  .  ,  .  The  first  reason  is,  because  all  men  like 
ease.  ...  A  second  reason  is  our  secret  approbation  of 
innocence  and  simplicity.  .  .  .  This  is  the  reason  why  we 
are  so  much  pleased  with  the  prattle  of  children.  ...  A 

Baby  clouts  and  baby  things, 

Baby  dolls  and  baby  houses, 

Little  misses,  little  spouses, 

Little  playthings,  little  toys. 

Little  girls,  and  little  boys. 
*  *  *  * 

Now  methinks  I  heai'  hiin  say 

Boys  and  girls  come  out  to  play,"  etc. 
As  to  "  Sally  in  Our  Alley,"  Carey,  in  the  3d  edition  of  his  poems,  p.  127, 
prefaces  the  poem  with  the  remark  that  he  meant  "  to  set  forth  the  beauty 
of  a  chaste  and  disinterested  passion  even  in  the  lowest  class  of  humanity." 
BLe  noticed  a  young  shoemaker's  prentice  making  holiday  with  his  sweet- 
heart, showing  her  Bedlam,  puppet-shows,  and  flying-chairs,  and  all  the 
elegance  of  Moortields.  He  gave  her  a  collation  of  buns,  cheese-cakes, 
gammon  of  bacon,  stuffed  beef,  and  bottled  ale.  The  author  followed 
them  through  the  crowd,  and  afterwards  wrote  his  poem,  but  "  being 
young  and  obscure,  was  very  much  ridiculed  by  some  of  his  acquaintance 
for  this  performance ;  which  nevertheless  made  its  way  into  the  polite 
world  and  amply  recompensed  him  by  the  applause  of  the  divine  Addif^on 
who  was  pleased  more  than  once  to  mention  it  with  approbation."  This 
is  but  one  of  many  incidental  proofs  of  Addison's  sound  taste  and  kind- 
heartedness. 


232  Enyllish  Literature. 

third  roason  is  our  love  of  the  country."  These  remarks 
surprise  us;  Pope's  and  Philips's  pastorals  seem  to  us  more 
artificial  than  a  brick  house  ;  yet,  for  three  hundred  years 
poems  as  vague  as  these  gave  our  ancestors  the  feeling  of 
being  out-doors.  To  our  thinking,  they  are  as  much  like 
nature  as  the  smoke  of  pastilles  is  like  fresh  air. 

Philips's  pastorals  were  praised  by  Addison  in  the 
l^pectator  (No.  523)  :  "He  has  given  a  new  life  and  a 
more  natural  beauty  to  this  way  of  writing  by  substitut- 
ing in  the  place  of  these  Antiquated  Fables,  the  sui^ersti- 
tious  Mythology  which  prevails  among  the  Shepherds  of 
our  own  Country."  This  praise  galled  Pope.  Among 
other  things  he  had  given  his  doll-like  shepherds  classical 
names,  pluming  himself  on  his  resemblance  to  Vergil, 
while  Philips  imitated  Spenser,  so  far  as  preserving  such 
names  as  Hobbinoll,  Colinet,  etc.,  may  imply  imitation. 
Pope's  method  of  redeeming  himself  was  characteris- 
tically ingenious.  He  sent,  anonymously,  to  Steele  a 
l)aper  for  the  Guardian  (No.  40),  in  which  he  gave  ironi- 
cal praise  to  Philips  for  all  that  was  poorest  in  his  pas- 
torals, and  found  pretended  fault  with  himself,  and  did  all 
this  so  slyly  that  it  was  only  after  it  was  printed  that  his 
real  design  became  evident.  Steele,  before  printing,  showed 
the  paper  to  Pope,  who  assented  to  its  publication.  Ad- 
dison is  reported  to  have  been  annoyed  by  this  inci- 
dent, and  it  does  not  seem  surprising.  He  had  praised 
Philips's  "  Distressed  Mother,"  the  play  Avhich  so  moved 
Sir  Roger,  and  he  had  always  spoken  well  of  Philips's 
work  ;  possibly,  too,  the  fact  that  this  writer  did  try  to 
])reserve  a  faint  ray  of  what  is  called  local  color  may 
have  attracted  him.*     However  this  may  be,  further  com- 

*  Pope  is  albO  suspected,  though  on  no  good  evidence,  of  liaving  insd- 
gated  Gay  to  write  his  moclv  pastorals,  "  The  Siiepherd's  VVeeit,"  in  parody 
of  Philips.     It  seems  quite  as  likely  that  Gay  wrote  this  for  his  owu 


E/iglUh  L'ltti'utut'e.  233 

plications  arose  between  him  and  Pope.  Dennis,  it  will 
be  remembered,  had  made  an  onslaught  on  Addison's 
"  Cato."     Pope  took  upon  himself  the  task  of  crushing 

amusement,  for  lie  was  by  no  means  a  solemn  person.  Swift,  who  cared 
but  little  for  conventional  poetry,  once  said  to  him  that  a  Newgate  pas- 
toral— i.  e.,  something  in  the  form  of  a  pastoral  wiih  the  grim  truth  of  life 
as  shown  by  erimiuals — would  be  an  amusing  thing,  and  Gay  wrote  the 
"  Beggar's  Opera."  Tiie  "  Shepherd's  Week,"  although  meant  for  a  cari- 
cature, was  taken  to  be  a  serious  picture  from  real  life.  So,  too,  the 
Guardian,  No.  40,  which  was  written  by  Pope,  was  for  a  long  time  sup- 
posed not  to  be  ironical.  Hannah  More  {vide  Elwyn's  "Pope,"  i.  254^ 
detected  the  imposition,  but  she  said  almost  every  one  else  differed  from 
her.  Of  couise,  those  directly  concerned  had  seen  through  Pope's  de- 
vice long  before,  but  they  were  not  anxious  to  spread  the  fact  abroad. 
Philips  himself  hung  up  a  stick  at  Buttons's  to  whip  his  brother-Arcadian 
with,  as  he  said,  in  case  they  should  ever  meet  there. 

It  is  curious  to  notice  that  the  Italian  pastoral  poets  were  turned  to  ridi- 
cule in  the  same  way  by  the  writers  of  burlesque,  Berni,  Folengo,  and 
Romolo  Bertini. 

To  return  to  Gay's  pastorals.  Gay  said  of  them  :  "  Thou  wilt  not  find  my 
shepherdesses  idly  piping  upon  oaten  reeds,  but  milking  the  kine,  tying  up 
the  siieaves,  or,  if  the  hogs  are  astray,  driving  them  to  their  styes.  My 
shepherd  gathereth  none  other  nosegays  but  what  are  the  growth  of  oiu' 
own  fields;  he  sleepeth  not  under  myrtle  shades,  but  under  a  hedge;  nor 
doili  he  vigilantly  defend  his  flocks  from  wolves,  because  there  are  none." 
Here  is  an  example  of  his  burlesque: 

"  If  by  the  dairy's  hatch  I  chance  to  hie, 

I  shall  her  goodly  countenance  espy. 

For  tiiere  her  goodly  countenance  I've  seen, 

Set  off  with  kerchief  starched  and  pinners  clean. 

Sometimes,  like  wa.x,  she  rolls  the  butter  round, 

Or  with  the  wooden  lily  prints  the  pound. 
*  -::-  *  *  * 

But  now,  alas!  these  ears  shall  hear  no  more 

The  whining  swine  surround  the  dairy  door; 

No  more  her  can  shall  fill  the  hollow  tray 

To  fat  the  guzzling  hogs  with  floods  of  whey. 

Lament,  ye  swine  !  in  grunting  spend  your  grief, 

For  you,  liiie  me,  have  lost  your  sole  relief. 


234  EiKjlhh  Literature. 

Dennis,  and  wrote  a  foul-mouthed,  pamphlet  of  personal 
abuse  of  the  poor  old  critic,  whom  he  represented  as 
raving  in  a  garret  over  the  failure  of  his  attack  on  the 
"  Cato."  The  criticisms  themselves  were  not  answered  at 
all,  Addison  got  Steele  to  write  a  note  to  Lintot  disavow- 
ing all  connection  with  this,  and  saying  that,  if  he  took 
notice  of  Mr.  Dennis's  criticisms,  it  should  be  in  such  a 
way  as  to  give  Mr.  Dennis  no  cause  of  complaint.  He 
added  that  he  had  refused  to  look  at  the  pamj)hlet  when 
it  was  offered  to  him,  and  that  he  had  expressed  his  dis- 
approval of  this  mode  of  attack.  It  is  not  made  clear  that 
he  knew  that  Pope  had  written  the  attack,  but  Pope  took 
umbrage  at  the  implied  reproof,  and  thus  was  laid  the 
foundation  of  a  famous  literary  quarrel.* 

II.  Although  Addison  agreed  with  posterity  in  being 
indifferent  to  Pope's  pastorals,  and  differed  from  it  in 
praising  Philips's,  he  warmly  commended  Pope's  "  Essay 
on  Criticism"  in  the  Spectator  (No.  253,  Dec.  20,  1711). 
Praise  from  Addison  was  something  to  be  grateful  for. 
He  stood  at  the  head  of  English  men  of  letters  at  this 
time,  and  his  position  and  his  age — he  was  fifty  years  old, 
while  Pope  was  twenty-four  —  authorized  him  to  warn 
Pope  against  denunciations  of  his  fellow-writers.  To  be 
sure,  those  whom  Poj)e  had  attacked  were  men  whom  the 
world  has  agreed  to  forget  or  to  remember  with  contempt, 
such  as  Dennis,  Sir  Richard  Blackmore,  and  Luke  Mil- 
bourne,  but  it  would  have  been  better  for  Pope's  name  if 
he  had  shown  some  of  Addison's  forbearance.  After  this 
slight  reproof,  Addison  had  nothing  but  commendation. 

After  the  good  man  warned  us  from  his  text, 
That  none  could  tell  whose  turn  it  would  be  next, 
He  said  that  heaven  would  take  her  soul,  no  doubt, 
And  spoke  the  hour-glass  in  her  praise — quite  out." 

*  FirfeMr.  Leslie  Stephen's  "  Pope,"  English  Men  of  Letters  Series,  p.  53. 


Knglish  Liferature.  235 

He  said,  after  speaking  of  the  friendships  between  literary 
men  in  ancient  times  :  "In  our  own  country  a  man  seldom 
sets  up  for  a  poet,  without  attacking  the  reputation  of  all 
his  brothers  in  the  art.  The  ignorance  of  the  moderns, 
the  Scribblers  of  the  age,  the  decay  of  poetry,  are  the 
topics  of  detraction  with  which  he  makes  his  entrance 
into  the  world.  ...  I  am  sorry  to  find  that  an  author, 
who  is  very  justly  esteemed  among  the  best  judges,  has 
admitted  some  strokes  of  this  nature  into  a  very  fine 
poem  :  I  mean  '  The  Art  of  Criticism,'  which  was  pub- 
lished some  months  since,  and  is  a  masterpiece  in  its 
kind." 

Pope  wrote  a  letter  thanking  Addison  for  his  kind 
notice,  saying  :  "  Though  it  be  the  highest  satisfaction 
to  find  myself  commended  by  a  writer  whom  all  the  world 
commends,  yet  I  am  not  more  obliged  to  you  for  that  than 
for  your  candour  and  frankness  in  acquainting  me  with  the 
error  I  have  been  guilty  of  in  speaking  too  freely  of  my 
brother  moderns." 

Addison  says  :  "  The  observations  follow  one  another 
like  those  in  Horace's  '  Art  of  Poetry.'  .  .  .  They  are 
some  of  them  uncommon,  but  such  as  the  reader  must 
assent  to,  when  he  sees  them  explained  with  that  elegance 
and  perspicuity  in  which  they  are  delivered.  As  for  those 
which  are  the  most  known,  and  the  most  received,  they  are 
placed  in  so  beautiful  a  light  and  illustrated  with  such  apt 
allusions,  that  they  have  in  them  all  the  graces  of  novelty, 
and  make  the  reader,  who  was  before  acquainted  with 
them,  still  more  convinced  of  their  truth  and  solidity." 
He  gives,  too,  many  examples  of  Pope's  excellence,  ending 
with  these  words:  "  I  cannot  conclude  this  paper  without 
taking  notice  that  we  have  three  poems  in  our  tongue, 
which  are  of  the  same  nature,  and  each  of  them  a  master- 
piece in  its  kind  ;  the  '  Essay  on  Translated  Verse,'  the 


2^6  KntjUsli  Litc/'utare. 

'  Essay  on  the  Art  of  Poetry,'  and  the  '  Essay  on  Criti- 
cism.' "  The  comparison  with  those  two  other  books  is  like- 
ly to  be  less  understood  as  a  compliment  at  present  than 
it  was  at  the  time  when  it  was  Avritten.  The  "  Essay  on 
Criticism"  is  still  a  classic,  while  the  others  are  seldom 
read.  The  "  Essay  on  Translated  Verse  "  was  written  by 
Lord  Roscommon  (1633-84),  and  published  the  year  of 
his  death.  It  is  best  known  to  posterity  by  two  lines,  for 
which  Pope  gets  all  the  credit  ;  just  as  in  our  times  all 
the  good  jokes,  old  and  new,  are  ascribed  to  Lamb  and 
Sidney  Smith.     The  lines  are  these  : 

"  Iimiiodest  words  admit  of  no  defence  ; 
For  want  of  decency  is  want  of  sense." 

Other  familiar  lines  of  his  are  : 

"  And  choose  an  anthor  as  you  would  choose  a  friend." 
"  The  multitude  is  always  in  the  wrong." 

The  final  couplet,  too,  of  this  passage  is  sometimes  quoted: 

"  But  who  did  ever  in  French  authors  see 
The  comprehensive  English  energy? 
The  weighty  bullion  of  one  Sterling  lino, 
Drawn  to  Fi'ench  wire,  would  through  whole  pages  shine." 

This  was  one  of  the  hand-books  of  the  literary  move- 
ment of  the  time  succeeding  the  Restoration,  and  it  is  in- 
teresting to  examine  the  faults  he  condemns,  such  as  these: 

"Absurd  expressions,  crude,  abortive  thoughts, 
All  the  lewd  legion  of  exploded  faults." 

Yet  Roscommon  ventured  to  denounce  the  couplet,  for 
he  said  : 

"  Of  many  faults,  rhyme  is  perhaps  the  cause; 
Too  strict  to  rhyme,  we  slight  more  useful  laws, 
P'or  that  in  Greece  or  Rome  was  never  known, 
Till  by  barbarian  deluges  o'erflown  ;"  etc. 
»  *  *  *  # 


Eixgllsh  Literature.  237 

"But  now  that  Plia'bus  and  tlie  Sacred  Nine, 
Witli  all  their  beams  on  our  bless'd  Island  shine, 
Why  should  not  we  their  ancient  rites  restore, 
And  be  what  Rome  or  Athens  were  before  ?" 

And  here  he  inserts  twenty-seven  lines  of  his  own,  writ- 
ten in  the  Miltonic  manner,*  and  ends  with  the  wish  : 

"  O  may  I  live  to  hail  the  glorious  day, 
And  sing  loud  paeans  through  the  crowded  way, 
When  in  triumphant  state  the  Britisii  Muse, 
True  to  herself,  shall  barbarous  aid  refuse, 
And  in  the  Roman  majesty  appear, 
Which  none  know  better,  and  none  come  so  near." 

Roscommon  also  translated  Horace's  "Ars  Poetica" 
into  blank  verse. 

The  other  piece  which  Addison  mentions  was  by  John 
Sheffield,  Duke  of  Buckinghamshire  ( 1649-1721 ),  who, 
when  he  was  Earl  of  Mulgrave,  wrote  the  "Essay  on  Sat- 
ire," a  part  of  which  Rochester  suspected  to  have  been 
Avritten  by  Dryden,  and  accordingly  had  him  beaten  by 
hired  ruffians.  Sheffield  also  made  over  Shakspere's  "  Ju- 
lius Caesar"  according  to  the  unities.  His  "Essay  on 
Poetry,"  1682,  begins  thus  : 

*  "  Have  we  forgot  how  Raphael's  numerous  prose 
Led  our  exalted  souls  through  heavenly  camps. 
And  marked  the  ground  where  proud  apostate  thronea 
Defied  Jehovah  !     Here,  'twixt  host  and  host, 
(A  narrow  but  a  dreadful  interval) 
Portentous  Sight !  before  the  cloudy  van 
Satan  with  vast  and  haughty  strides  advanced. 
Came  towering  armed  in  adamant  and  gold."     Etc. 

This  is  probably  the  first  imitation  of  Milton  extant.  Roscommon  died  in 
1684,  in  which  year  this  essay  was  published.  His  own  blank  verse  in  the 
translation  of  the  "  Ars  Poetica  "  is  most  crabbed. 

Samuel  Say  ("  Poems,"  London,  1745)  has  an  imitation  of  Milton  dated 
IfiOS. 


23^  English  Liteymture. 

"  Of  all  those  arts  in  which  the  wise  excel, 
Nature's  chief  masterpiece  is  writing  well :" 

and  he  proceeds  to  give  the  rules  for  writing  well. 

"  Here  I  shall  all  the  various  sorts  of  verse, 
And  the  whole  art  of  poetry  rehearse ; 
But  who  that  task  would  after  Hoi  ace  do? 
The  best  of  masters,  and  examples,  too ! 
Echoes  at  best,  all  we  can  say  is  vain," 

he  adds,  with  truth.  He  goes  on  to  mention,  "  first,  then, 
of  songs  ;"  "  next,  Elegy,  of  sweet,  but  solemn  voice  ;"  "  a 
happier  flight,  and  of  a  happier  force,  are  Odes,  the  Muses' 
most  unruly  horse  ;"  "  satire  ;"  "  the  Stage."  Of  this  last 
he  says  : 

"  The  unities  of  action,  time,  and  place, 
Which,  if  observed,  give  plays  so  great  a  grace, 
Are,  though  but  little  practised,  too  well  known 
To  be  taught  here,  where  we  pretend  alone 
From  nicer  faults  to  purge  the  present  age, 
Less  obvious  errors  of  the  English  stage." 

This  is  a  bad  beginning,  but  what  he  has  to  say  about 
the  writing  of  plays  is  well  worth  a  moment's  attention, 
as  when  he  says  : 

"  Who  can  choose  but  pity 
A  dying  hero,  miserably  witty  ? 
But,  oh  !  the  dialogues,  where  jest  and  mock 
Is  held  up  like  a  rest  at  shuttlecock ; 
Or  else  like  bells,  eternally  they  chime, 
They  sigh  in  simile  and  die  in  rhyme." 
He  says  : 

"Shakspere  and  Fletcher  are  the  wonders  now: 
****** 
Their  beauties  imitate  but  not  their  faults, 
First,  on  a  plot  employ  thy  careful  thoughts." 

He  warns  against  perfect  characters  : 

"  There's  no  such  thing  in  nature,  and  you'll  draw 
A  faultless  monster  which  the  world  ne'er  saw." 


English  Literature.  239 

And  finally,  in  speaking  of  the  epic,  he  says  : 

"Read  Homer  once,  and  you  can  read  no  more; 
For  all  books  else  appear  so  mean,  so  poor, 
Verse  will  seem  prose ;  but  still  persist  to  read. 
And  Homer  will  be  all  the  books  you  need." 

This_brief  recapitulation  will  make  clearer  the  relation 
of  Pope's  poem,  the  "  Essay  on  Criticism,"  to  contempo- 
rary literature.  It  is  sufficiently  remarkable  as  the  work 
of  a  young  man  of  but  twenty-two,  but  the  merit  lies  in 
the  execution,  not,  as  we  might  think  Avithout  examina- 
tion, in  the  conception.  What  lay  nearest  at  hand  was 
Boileau's  poem,  "  L'Art  Poetique  "  ( 1674  ),  which  was 
translated  as  early  as  1680,  and  published  in  1683,  with 
revisions  by  Dryden,  with  whose  works  it  is  commonly 
printed.*  Naturally,  at  the  time  of  the  Renaissance,  one 
of  the  most  important  questions  had  been  how  men  should 
write,  and,  as  we  have  seen,  since  it  seemed  as  if  the  an- 
cients had  alone  known  the  answer,  the  moderns  had  gone 
back  to  those  who  had  spoken  with  the  most  authority. 
We  have  seen  the  enormous  influence  of  Aristotle  ;  Hor- 
ace, too,  was  scarcely  less  respected.  His  "  Ars  Poetica" 
held  the  position  in  regard  to  literature  that  Euclid  has 
held  in  astronomy.  It  was  in  1567  that  Thomas  Drant 
made  the  first  English  translation  of  that  poem.  About 
1603,  Ben  Jonson  made  another  translation  f  in  exceedingly 

*  With  English  names,  put  in  as  illustrations,  in  place  of  the  French 
ones  employed  by  Boileau. 

Cf.  Oldham's  Horace,  "His  Art  of  Poetry,"  imitated  in  English  (1684), 
"  putting  Horace  into  a  more  modern  dress,  than  hitherto  he  has  appeared 
in — that  is,  by  making  him  speak  as  if  he  were  living  now.  I  therefore 
resolved  to  alter  the  scene  from  Rome  to  London,  and  make  use  of  Eng- 
lish names  of  men,  places,  and  customs,  when  the  parallel  would  decently 
permit." 

f  Vide  "To  the  Readers  of  Sejanus,"  p.  137,  where  he  says  he  shall 
speak  of  ancient  drama  "  in  my  observations  upon  Horace,  his  Art  of 


240  Eiujlitih  Literature. 

rugged  verse.  The  first  of  the  moderns  to  write  a  ccds 
of  laws  for  literature  was  Trissino,*  the  same  man  whose 
"  Sof  onisba  "  lent  such  additional  gloom  to  European  trag- 
edy. In  France,  there  were  many  who  taught  the  same 
lesson.  Yet,  it  is  to  be  noticed,  the  greatest  writers  of 
Italy  and  of  England  came  before  these  new  teachers 
of  the  way  to  w^'ite.  Petrarch,  Boccaccio,  Ariosto,  like 
Chaucer,  Spenser,  and  the  great  Elizabethan  dramatists, 
owed  nothing  to  the  rigid  rules  which  men  like  Tris- 
sino, Buileau,  and  Poj^e  w^ere  to  preach  as  a  new  gospel. 
Even  in  France,  the  first  fruits  of  the  Renaissance  were, 
although  of  moderate  literary  value,  of  the  same  kind. 
Du  Bellay,  Belleau,  and  Ronsard  were  first  deposed  by 
Malherbe,  and  then  thrown  into  the  shade  by  the  great 
French  classic  writers,  and  were  neglected  until  about 
a  century  ago,  when  the  chains  were  broken  ;  and  since 
then  these  older  writers  have  received  the  praise  which 
is  their  due.  The  reason  of  this  change  becomes  plain 
on  consideration.  The  first  efi^ect  of  the  revival  of  let- 
ters was  purely  stimulating  ;  and  in  the  place  of  the 
meagre  traditional  lore,  the  scraps  of  antiquity  which 
formed  the  whole  supply  of  the  Dark  Ages,  there  were 
given  them  the  magnificent  literatures  of  the  ancient 
world,  and  they  turned  with  fervor  to  their  writing.  In 
their  enthusiasm,  they  did  not  break  loose  from  the  Mid- 
Poetry,  which,  with  the  text,  I  intend  shortly  to  publish.''  These  observa- 
tions are  lost.  In  his  "  Timber,  or  Discoveries  Made  upon  Men  and  Mat- 
ters," he  speaks  of  Aristotle  as  a  great  critic,  and  of  the  need  of  the  unity 
of  action  in  the  drama,  but  says  nothing  of  the  other  rules.  They  were 
unknown  in  England  at  this  time.  They  first  came  into  England  through 
Dryden's  praise  of  Bossu  and  Rapin. 

Webbe,  Puttenham,  etc.,  make  no  mention  of  these  rules,  and  they  were 
continually  groi)ing  for  statements  of  this  kind. 

Sidney,  to  be  sure,  had  commended  them  in  his  "Defence  of  Poesy," 
but  withoTit  effect. 


EiKjUsIt  Literature.  241 

die  Ages.  They  took  the  material  that  lay  ready  to  the 
hand.  In  Italy,  Ariosto,  for  instance,  did  not  scorn  the 
romances  of  chivalry.  Shakspere  wrote  about  Hamlet  or 
jMacbeth  as  freely  as  about  Julius  Ctesar  ;  it  was  only  later 
that  Otway  found  it  necessary  to  alter  the  mediaeval  "  Ro- 
meo and  Juliet "  into  a  play  of  ancient  Rome.  The  early 
pedantic  attempts  to  translate  Greek  originals,  such  as  the 
Italian  version  of  the  "  (Edipus,"  *  Dolce's  "  Jocasta,"  Gas- 
coigne's  rendering  of  this  same  "Jocasta,"  and  Jodelle's 
"  Cleopatre  "  and  "  Didon,"  clearly  implied  breaking  al- 
legiance to  the  native  traditions,  although  there  was  no 
avowed  hostility  between  the  classic  leaven  and  the  abun- 
dant native  material,  such  as  arose  later.  When  this  first 
fervor  died  out,  and  people  turned  to  books  for  directions 
about  writing  rather  than  for  a  sympathetic  glow,  the  rules 
were  deemed  of  the  utmost  importance,  pedants  got  into 
power,  and  pseudo-classicism  held  full  sway  over  the  litera- 
ture and  taste  of  modern  Europe.  This  deliberate  wooden 
imitation  of  classical  models  was  then,  so  to  speak,  the  sober 
second-thought  of  the  Renaissance  :  the  first  was  one  of 
delight,  and  it  inspired  great  works  in  Italy  and  England  ; 
the  other  followed,  correcting,  pruning,  revising,  mistaking 
pallid  faultlessness  for  perfection,  but  yet  teaching  cor- 
rectness and  precision.  All  of  this  was,  it  must  be  remem- 
bered, for  the  Italians  the  resixmption  of  an  interrupted 
growth,  a  restoration  of  shattered  continuity  ;  but  else- 
where it  was  a  foreign  importation.  In  France,  various  cir- 
cumstances, especially  the  Hundred  Years'  Wai*,  broke  the 
connection  between  the  Middle  Ages  and  modern  times, 
and  the  greater  literature  of  that  country  belongs  to  the 
classical  period  and  its  legitimate  successors.  In  England 
and  in  Spain,  this  movement  was  less   marked  than  in 

*  By  Giuvanni  Andrea  dell'  Angnillara. 
11 


242  English  Literature. 

Italy,  just  as  the  earthqi;ake  that  destroyed  Lisbon  was 
marked  only  by  an  unusually  high  tide  on  the  English 
coast.  We  thus  see  more  clearly  the  coherence  of  the 
literature  of  different  countries  the  more  closely  we  ex- 
amine that  of  any  one.  They  were,  and  are,  all  fellow- 
workers  in  the  great  task  of  clearing  away  the  Middle 
Ages,  a  process  not  yet  completed,  for  no  new  system  has 
yet  been  announced  which  we  are  to  obey.  This  has  ad- 
vanced by  three  steps,  the  Renaissance,  the  Reformation, 
and  Revolution.*  The  a^e  of^Pope  was  in  literature  a  time 
of  Reformation.  We  need  not  fear  to  think  that  we  are 
living  in  one  of  Revolution,  of  which  the  outbreak  of  Ro- 
manticism was  but  a  ^preliminary  riot.  Certainly  the  time 
is  ripe^  for  it ;  the  present  unceasing  imitation  of  every- 
thing that  has  found  success  before  shows,  by  its  being  an 
artistic  process,  that  the  old  methods  are  dead,  and  writ- 
ers cannot  forever  go  on  pretending  that  they  are  some- 
body else.  Let  us  not  be  alarmed  ;  we  need  only  to  take 
courage  from  observing  the  groundlessness  of  the  fears 
that  agitated  our  ancestoi-s  when  the  school  of  Pope  was 
overthrown.  It  seemed  to  them  as  if  the  world  were  re- 
lapsing into  savagery,  especially  when  it  no  longer  was 
possible  to  bind  up  all  truth  in  a  book.  There  is  a  con- 
stant yearning  of  the  human  race  to  take  a  printed  volume 
as  the  sole  receptacle  of  truth  about  literature  and  art,  and  a 
constant  discovery  that  this  wish  is  unattainable.  Yet  here, 
as  everywhere,  other  people's  experience  is  worthless. 

As  to  Pope's  version  of  the  poetic  art,  it  survives  as  the 
last  and  best  of  the  many  manuals,  as  Boileau's  does  in 
France.  I  have  mentioned  Pope's  predecessors.  Boileau 
had  many  more.f     His  own  "Art  Poetique  "  is  now  a  most 

*  Symonds,  "Renaissance  in  Italy,"  v.  530. 

f  Eustace  Deschamps  (1338-1415),  the  "  Jardin  de  Plai^ince  et  Ics 
Fleurs  de  Rhetorique"  (1547),  Pierre  Fabri,  Th.  Sebilet  (1648),  Jacques 


English  Literature.  243 

readable  poem  in  the  original.  Althougli  Boileau,  when 
charged  with  writing  merely  an  imitation  of  Horace,  re- 
plied that  this  was  scarcely  a  fair  statement,  inasmuch  as 
but  fifty  or  sixty  lines  out  of  eleven  thousand  could  be 
called  imitations,  he  was  inexact,  because  the  whole  poem 
was  really  founded  on  Horace.  It  was  an  adaptation  of 
the  Roman  poet's  "Ars  Poetica."  Pope's  "Essay  on 
Criticism,"  as  I  have  said,  was  of  the  same  literary  fam- 
ily. It  has  been  very  highly  praised,  and  it  has  been  at- 
tacked with  equal  ardor.  Dr.  Johnson  called  it  one  of 
Pope's  greatest  works  ;  Warton  said  it  was  a  master- 
piece ;  De  Quincey  found  fault  with  it  ;  Hazlitt  said  it 
was  a  double-refined  essence  of  wit  and  sense  ;  and  El- 
wyn,  his  latest  editor,  attacks  it  most  indiscreetly,  putting 

Pelletier  (1555),  Vauquelin  de  la  Fresnaie  {cii:  15*76,  published  1605), 
Pierre  de  Laudrim  d'Aigalliers,  Ronsard,  Mile,  de  Gournay,  etc. ;  vide 
Goujct,  "  Biljlioth^que  Fraii<jaise,"  iii.  459.  Vauquelin  de  la  Fresnaie  (the 
first  French  satirist)  wrote  in  his  "Art  Poe'tique"  (CEuvres,  i.  90): 

"  Tu  peu.K  encore  faire  une  sorte  d'ouvrage, 
Qu'on  pent  nominer  forest  ou  naturel  bocage : 
Qu'on  fait  sur  le  chara,  en  plaisir,  en  fureur, 
Un  vers  qui  de  la  Muse  est  un  Avancoureur 
Et  que  pour  un  sujet  ou  court  par  la  carriere, 
Sans  bride  gallopant  sur  la  mesrae  matiere, 
Pousse  de  la  chaleur,  qu'on  suit  k  I'abandon, 
D'une  grand'  violence  et  d'un  aspre  randon. 

Stace  fut  le  premier  en  la  langue  Romaine, 
Qui  courut  librement  par  cette  large  plaine. 
Comme  dans  les  forests  les  arbres  soustenus 
Sur  les  pieds  naturel,  sans  art  ainsi  venus. 
Leur  perruque  jamais  n'ayant  este  coupee, 
Sont  quelquefois  plus  beau  qu'une  taille  serpee. 
Aussi  cette  fa9on  en  beaute  passera 
Souvent  un  autre  vers  qui  plus  lime  sera." 

This  quotation,  however,  does  Vauquelin  no  justice;  he  was  not  often 
so  wide  of  the  mark.     See  his  •'  Idillies,"  liv.  ii.  9,  12,  and  24. 


244  Ji^nylisk  Literature. 

on  Pope  all  the  blame  which  belongs  to  the  age  in  which 
he  lived.  It  is  hard  not  to  admire  the  poem  as  a  work  of 
art,  however  much  we  may  differ  in  our  views  of  the  rules 
he  inculcates.  In  execution,  compare  it  with  these  lines 
from  the  translation  of  Boileau  : 

"  Wliate'er  you  write  of  pleasant  or  sublime, 
Always  let  sense  accompany  your  rhyme : 
Falsely  they  seem  each  other  to  oppose; 
Rhyme  must  be  made  with  reason's  laws  to  close: 
And  when  to  conquer  her  you  bend  your  force, 
The  mind  will  triumph  in  the  noble  course, 
To  reason's  yoke  she  quickly  will  incline, 
Which,  far  from  hurting,  renders  her  divine  : 
But  if  neglected  will  as  easily  stray, 
And  master  reason  which  she  should  obey. 
Love  reason,  then ;  and  let  whatever  you  write 
Borrow  from  her  its  beauty,  force,  and  light,"  etc. 

This  is  clumsy  work  by  the  side  of  the  facile  grace  of 
the  lines  with  which  Pope's  "  Essay  on  Criticism  "  *  opens  : 

"  'lis  bard  to  say  if  greater  want  of  skill 
Appear  in  writing  or  in  judging  ill ; 

*  Of  course  the  commentators  have  been  over  this  poem ;  they  have 
proved  that  where  Pope  wrote 

"When  first  young  Maro  in  his  boundless  mind 
A  work  t'outlast  immortal  Rome  designed," 
"  the  word  outlast  is  improper ;  for  A'irgil,  like  a  true  Roman,  never  dreamt 
of  the  mortality  of  the  city  "  (Wakefield). 
More  amusing  is  this  comment : 

"  Some  on  the  leaves  of  ancient  authors  prey, 
Nor  time,  nor  moths,  e'er  spoiled  as  much  as  they." 

"  This  is  a  quibble.  Time  and  moths  spoil  books  by  destroying  them. 
The  commentators  only  spoiled  them  by  explaining  them  badly.  The  edi- 
tors were  so  far  from  spoiling  books  in  the  same  sense  as  time,  that  by 
multiplying  copies  they  assisted  to  preserve  them"  (Elwyn).  With  more 
justice  they  point  out  obscure  and  prosaic  lines. 


English  Literature.  245 

But  of  the  two  less  dangerous  is  th'  offence 
To  tire  our  patience  than  mislead  our  sense. 
8ome  few  in  that,  but  numbers  err  in  this, 
Ten  censure  wrong  for  one  who  writes  amiss; 
A  fool  might  once  aione  himself  expose, 
Now  one  in  verse  makes  many  more  in  prose. 

'Tis  with  our  judgments,  as  our  watches,  none 
Go  just  alike,  3'et  each  believes  his  own; 
In  poets  as  true  genius  is  but  rare. 
True  taste  as  seldom  is  the  critic's  share,"  etc. 

The  "Windsor  Forest"  (published  in  1715)  need  not 
occupy  our  attention.  Yet  Wordsworth,  in  one  of  his 
prefaces,  reprinted  in  the  second  volume  of  his  prose 
works,  where  he  assaulted  the  literature  of  the  time  we 
are  now  considering,  said  that,  "  excepting  the  '  Noctur- 
nal Reverie '  *  of  Lady  Winchelsea,  and  a  passage  or  two 

*  For  Lady  Winchelsea,  vide  Wai'd's  "  English  Poets,"  iii.  27; 

"  In  such  a  night,  when  every  louder  wind 
Is  to  its  distant  cavern  safe  confined, 
And  only  gentle  Zephyr  fans  liis  wings. 
And  lonely  Philomel,  still  waking,  sings. 
Or  from  some  tree,  framed  for  the  owl's  delight. 
She  hollowing  clear,  directs  the  wanderer  right, — 
In  such  a  night,  when  passing  clouds  give  place, 
Or  thinly  veil  the  heaven's  mysterious  face. 
When  in  some  river,  overhung  with  green. 
The  waving  moon  and  trembling  leaves  are  seen. 
When  freshened  grass  now  bears  itself  upi'ight. 
And  makes  cool  banks  to  pleasing  rest  invite. 
Whence  spring  the  woodbine  and  the  bramble-rose, 
And  where  the  sleepy  cowslip  sheltered  grows, 
Whilst  now  a  paler  hue  the  foxglove  takes. 
Yet  chequers  still  with  red  the  dusky  brakes. 
Where  scattered  glow-worms, — but  in  twilight  fine, — 
Shew  trivial  beauties,  watch  their  hour  to  shine. 
While  Salisbury  stands  the  test  of  every  light. 
In  perfect  charms  and  perfect  beauty  bright ; 


246  English  Literature. 

in  the  '  "Windsor  Forest '  of  Pope,  the  poetry  of  the  period 
intervening  between  the  publication  of  the  '  Paradise 
Lost.'  and  the  '  Seasons '  does  not  contain  a  single  new 
image  of  external  nature,  and  scarcely  presents  a  familiar 
one  from  which  it  can  be  inferred  that  the  eye  of  the  poet 
has  been  steadily  fixed  upon  his  object,  much  less  that  his 
feelings  had  urged  him  to  work  upon  it  in  the  spirit  of 
genuine  imagination."   It  is  not  easy  to  decide  what  are  the 

When  odours,  which  declined  repelling  day, 

Through  temperate  air  uninterrupted  straj' ; 

When  darkened  groves  their  softest  shadows  wear, 

And  falling  waters  we  distinctly  hear ; 

AVhen  through  the  gloom  more  venerable  shows 

Some  ancient  fabric  awful  in  repose ; 

While  sunburned  hills  their  swarthy  looks  conceal, 

And  swelling  haycocks  thicken  up  the  vale ; 

When  the  loosed  horse  now,  as  his  pasture  leads, 

Comes  slowly  grazing  through  the  adjoining  meads. 

Whose  stealing  pace  and  lengthened  shade  we  fear, 

Till  torn-up  forage  in  his  teeth  we  hear; 

When  nibbling  sheep  at  large  pursue  their  food, 

And  unmolested  kine  rechew  the  cud ; 

When  curlews  cry  beneath  the  village  walls. 

And  to  her  straggling  brood  the  partridge  calls ; 

Their  short-lived  jubilee  the  creatures  keep, 

Which  but  endures,  whilst  tyrant  man  doth  sleep; 

When  a  sedate  content  the  spirit  feels, 

And  no  fierce  light  disturbs,  whilst  it  reveals ; 

But  silent  musings  urge  the  mind  to  seek 

Something  too  high  for  syllables  to  speak ; 

Till  the  free  soul  to  a  composedness  charmed. 

Finding  the  elements  of  rage  disarmed, 

O'er  all  below  a  solemn  quiet  grown, 

Joys  in  the  inferior  world,  and  thinks  it  like  her  own  ; 

In  such  a  night  let  me  abroad  remain, 

Till  morning  breaks  and  all's  confused  again  ; 

Our  cares,  our  toils,  our  clamours  are  renewed. 

Our  pleasures,  seldom  reached,  again  pursued." 


EiKjliah  Literature.  247 

passages  in  the  "  Windsor  Forest "  that  he  meant.  Gray, 
one  might  say,  shouhi  be  exchided  from  this  condemna- 
tion.    Parnell,*  too,  was,  in  his  way,  a  new  voice. 

*  Parnell  is  the  first  of  the  school  of  Young  and  Blair ;  vide  his  "  Night- 
Piece  on  Death." 

Goldsmith,  in  his  "Life  of  Parnell,"  cir.  1763,  says:  "It  is  indeed 
amazing,  after  what  has  been  done  by  Dryden,  Addison,  and  Pope,  to  im- 
prove and  harmonize  our  native  tongue,  that  their  successors  should  have 
taken  pains  to  involve  it  into  pristine  barbarity.  These  misguided  inno- 
vators have  not  been  content  with  restoring  antiquated  words  and  phrases, 
but  have  indulged  themselves  in  the  most  licentious  transpositions,  and 
the  harsliest  constructions,  vainly  imagining,  that  the  more  their  writings 
are  unlike  prose,  the  more  they  resemble  poetry.  They  have  adopted  a 
language  of  their  own,  and  call  upon  mankind  for  admiration.  All  those 
who  do  not  understand  them  are  silent,  and  those  who  make  out  their 
meaning  are  willing  to  praise,  to  show  they  understand.  From  these  .  .  . 
affectations  the  poems  of  Parnell  are  entirely  free."  The  "Night-Piece," 
he  says,  "  deserves  every  praise ;  and  I  should  suppose,  with  very  little 
amendment,  might  be  made  to  surpass  all  those  night-pieces  and  church- 
yard scenes  that  have  since  appeared." 

Yet,  in  the  Elizabethan  period,  which,  as  a  friend  of  mine  suggests,  held 
the  various  characteristic  traits  of  later  times  in  solution,  we  find  ex- 
amples of  this  quality,  as  in  Fletcher's 

"  Hence,  all  you  vain  delights, 
As  short  as  are  the  nights 

Wherein  you  spend  your  folly! 
There's  nought  in  this  life  sweet, 
If  man  were  wise  to  see  't, 

But  only  melancholy. 

Oh,  sweetest  melancholy  ! 
Welcome,  folded  arms,  and  fixed  eyes, 
A  sight  that  piercing  mortifies  ! 
A  look  that's  fastened  to  the  ground, 
A  tongue  chain'd  up  without  a  sound ! 
Fountain  heads,  and  pathless  groves. 
Places  which  pale  passion  loves  ! 
Moonlight  walks,  when  all  the  fowls 
Are  warmly  housed,  save  bats  and  owls ! 


24S  Enylhh  Literature. 

The  "Rape  of  the  Lock"  (1712,  and  enlarged,  1714) 
has  been  praised  veiy  highly,  and  is  generally  much  ad- 
mired. De  Quincey  calls  it  "  the  most  exquisite  monument 
of  playful  fancy  that  universal  literature  offers."  Hazlitt: 
it  "is  the  most  exquisite  filigree  work  ever  invented. 
...  It  is  the  perfection  of  the  mock  heroic  ;"  and  many 
echoing  forms  of  this  commendation  may  be  accumulated 
by  the  curious.  Yet,  it  would  seem  as  if  it  was  only  Avhen 
the  heroic  is  admired  that  the  mock-heroic  can  be  fully 
appreciated,  and  if  one  goes  the  other  must  go  Avitli  it. 
However  this  may  be,  I  may  as  well  own  frankly  that  I 
am  unable  to  admire  the  poem.  It  is,  of  course,  clever, 
but  I  fail  to  get  such  delight  from  its  lines  as  has  reward- 
ed the  eminent  men  who  have  written  about  it.  It  is  im- 
possible to  avoid  the  thought  that  patriotism  is  in  part 
the  cause  of  this  admiration.  Warton  says  ("  Elwyn,"  ii. 
116)  :  "If  some  of  the  most  candid  among  the  French 
critics  begin  to  acknowledge  that  they  have  produced 
nothing  in  point  of  sublimity  and  majesty  equal  to  the 
'  Paradise  Lost,'  we  may  also  venture  to  affirm  that  in 
point  of  delicacy,  elegance,  and  fine -turned  raillery,  on 
Avhicli  they  have  so  much  valued  themselves,  they  have 
produced  nothing  equal  to  the  '  Rape  of  the  Lock.'  "  The 
French  speak  with  equal  enthusiasm  of  Boileau's  "  Le 
Lutrin"  (1674),  and  every  new  Italian  editor  of  Tassoni's 
"La  Secchia  Rapita  "  (1624)  proceeds  at  once  to  demol- 
ishing Boileau's  pretensions.*     The  Italian  poem  is  long, 

A  midnight  bell,  a  parting  groan  ! 
Tliese  are  the  sounds  we  feed  upon ; 

Then  stretch  your  bones  in  a  still  gloomy  valley, 
Nothing's  so  dainty  sweet  as  lovely  melancholy." 
*  La  Harpe,  in  reviewing  a  French  translation  of  Pope's  works,  says: 
" '  Le  Lutrin  '  est  un  chef  d'opuvre  poetiqne,  une  de  ces  creations  du  grand 
tal.-nt,  dans  laquellc  il  a  su  faire  beaucoup  de  rien."     On  the  other  hand, 


English  Literature.  249 

consisting  of  twelve  cantos  of  about  sixty  stanzas  each, 
and  narrates  imaginary  wars,  with  an  abundance  of  de- 
nunciations of  the  author's  enemies  ;  Boileau's  mock- 
heroic,  in  describing  the  controversy  over  the  proper  place 
for  a  reading-desk,  blames  several  common  ecclesiastical 
faults,  and  Pope's  is  too  well  known  to  need  describing. 
If  the  French  have  never  written  anything  superior  in 
delicacy  and  fine-turned  raillery  to  this  poem,  then  their 
literature  has  not  done  them  justice. 

This  passage  is  pleasing  enough,  where  Ariel,  the  chief 
of  the  sylphs,  says  : 

"  Our  humbler  province  is  to  tend  the  fair, 
***** 
To  save  the  powder  from  too  rude  a  gale, 
Nor  let  th'  imprisoned  essences  exhale ; 
To  draw  fresh  colours  from  the  vernal  flowers ; 
To  steal  from  rainbows  ere  they  drop  in  showers 
The  brightest  wash ;  to  curl  their  waving  hairs, 
Assist  their  blushes,  and  inspire  their  airs  ; 
Nay  oft,  in  dreams,  invention  we  bestow. 
To  change  a  flounce  or  add  a  furbelow." 

But  whatever  levity  there  may  be  here,  it  disappears, 
and  the  smile  that  accompanies  it  gives  way  to  an  un- 
pleasant leer,  when  we  come  to  such  heavy-handed  social 
satire  as  this  : 

"  Whether  the  nymph  shall  break  Diana's  law, 

Or  some  frail  china-jar  receive  a  flaw ; 

Or  stain  her  honour,  or  her  new  brocade; 

Forget  her  prayers,  or  miss  a  masquerade." 

Yet,  barring  these  faults,  it  is  certainly  an  agreeable 
squib.  It  was  first  written  without  any  mention  of  the 
sylphs  ;  these  were  an  afterthought.     Some  critics  find  a 

one  may  examine  the  "  Rape  of  the  Lock,"  "  et  Ton  verra  cinq  chants 
absolument  denuees  d'action,  de  caract^res,  de  mouvement,  d'interet, 
d'idees,  et  de  variete." 

11* 


2 CO  English  Literature. 

close  connection  between  them  and  the  fairies  in  the 
"  Tempest ;"  they  say  that  it  is  a  very  appropriate  con- 
tinuation of  Shakspere's  fairy -land,  which  may  mean  that 
the  description  of  them  in  this  poem  is  something  like 
what  Shakspere  would  have  written  had  he  lived  in  the 
more  prosaic  age.  This  is,  of  course,  a  question  which 
no  one  can  answer  with  certainty,  but  there  is  room  for 
modest  doubt.  Fairies  do  not  follow  the  fashions  ;  when 
hoops  and  patches  come  in,  wings  do  not  necessarily  go 
out,  and  I  find  it  hard  to  trace  any  family  connection  be- 
tween 

"  Come  unto  these  yellow  sands, 
And  then  take  hands  : 
Courtesied  when  you  have  and  kissed 
The  wild  waves  whist 
Foot  it  featly  here  and  there,"  etc., 
and 

"  Know  then  unnumbered  spirits  round  thee  ply, 
The  light  militia  of  the  lower  sky  : 
These,  the  unseen,  are  ever  on  the  wing. 
Hang  o'er  the  box,  and  hover  round  the  ring,"  etc. 

And  this  is  not  merely  saying,  what  needs  not  to  be 
said,  that  Pope  is  not  Shakspere;  there  is  an  absolute  lack 
of  resemblance  between  the  imagination  of  the  one  and 
the  artificial  invention  of  the  other.  Pope's  sylphs  lend 
the  chai-m  of  cleverness  to  his  verse,  and  any  further  claim 
in  their  behalf  seems  to  me  monstrous.  Still,  a  poem  may 
be  less  good  than  Shakspere's  best  passages,  and  yet  have 
merit  ;  and,  if  we  do  not  try  to  rate  the  "Rape  of  the 
Lock"  too  high,  it  will  be  possible  to  enjoy  it.  We 
should  laugh  at  a  Frenchman  who  maintained  that  Boi- 
Icau's  mock-heroic  was  to  be  compared  with  Shakspere's 
poetical  songs.  No  one  could  entertain  the  notion  for  a 
moment,  yet  there  is  no  wide  difference  between  Boileau 
and  Pope  here  ;  each  is  able,  in  his  own  way,  and  as  con- 


English  Liter atu7'e.  251 

temporaries  —  for  contemporaneousness  does  not  always 
follow  the  dates  of  the  almanac  any  more  than  isothermal 
lines  do  parallels  of  latitude — they  were  inspired  by  the 
same  subjects.  This,  too,  is  to  be  borne  in  mind  with  re- 
gard to  alleged  imitations  of  one  poet  by  another.  Be- 
cause one  nation  does  at  some  time  what  another  did  a 
few  years  earlier,  it  by  no  means  follows  that  it  is  inspired 
by  imitation,  any  more  than  does  the  fact  that  I,  who  put 
on  my  thick  coat  day  before  yesterday,  had  any  desire, 
conscious  or  unconscious,  of  imitating  my  fellow-country- 
man in  Chicago  who  put  his  on  two  days  earlier.  He  was 
the  first  to  be  exposed  to  the  northwest  blast,  that  is  all. 
Of  course,  one  nation  may  impose  its  authority  on  another 
by  virtue  of  its  success  ;  thus,  the  brilliant  civilization  of 
Italy  made  its  literary  tenets  only  the  more  authoritative, 
but  the  movement  sj^read,  too,  as  the  natural  effort  to  find 
something  to  take  the  place  of  the  enthusiasm  of  the 
Renaissance.  They  tried  to  arrange  their  knowledge,  and 
they  made  it  an  idol  to  which  almost  everything  was  sac- 
rificed. It  seems  not  to  be  worth  while,  then,  to  trace  the 
lineage  of  the  mock-heroic  poems.  They  were  as  natural  as 
shadows.  Given  the  heroic,  and  the  mock-heroic  follows; 
the  parody  following  the  original  as  night  follows  day. 

This  work  brought  Pope  a  great  deal  of  fame,  although 
it  added  but  little  to  his  wealth.  He  had  also  published 
his  translation  of  the  first  book  of  Statins,  some  ver- 
sions of  Chaucer  in  imitation  of  Dryden,  his  "  Eloisa  to 
Abelard,"  "  Sappho  to  Phaon,"  etc.,  but  he  was  far  from 
rich.  His  father  had  a  fortune  of  about  £10,000,  and  when 
he  died,  in  1717,  he  left  his  son  an  income  of  three  or  four 
hundred  pounds  ;  but  Catholics  paid  double  taxes,  and 
])robably  there  was  a  good  deal  of  fanatic  zeal  in  the  way 
these  taxes  were  assessed  and  collected.  We  have  seen 
that  Pope  had  nothing  to  do  with  government  aid  to  au- 


25-  Knyllsh  Literature. 

tliors.  Most  writers  of  the  time  published  their  books  by 
subscription,*  with  flattering  dedications.  Pope  now  cast 
about  for  some  way  of  securing  independence  by  his  liter- 
ary labors.  He  determined  to  make  a  translation  of  the 
"  Iliad."  The  booksellers  made  generous  offers,  and  Pope 
accepted  that  of  Lintot,t  who  proposed  that  the  book  be 
sold  by  subscription,  he  himself  undertaking  to  supply 
each  subscriber  with  his  copies,  to  bring  the  work  out  in 
six  volumes  quarto,  and  to  pay  to  Pope  all  the  product  of 
the  subscription  and,  besides,  £200  for  each  volume.  He, 
of  course,  reserved  for  himself  the  profits  of  the  succeeding 
editions,  and  on  these  he  grew  rich  and  was  able  to  leave  a 
valuable  property  for  his  heirs.  There  were  five  hundred 
and  seventy-five  subscribers,  who  took  six  hundred  and 
fifty-four  copies,  so  that  Pope  received  £5320  4s.  The  suc- 
cess of  this  venture  emboldened  him  to  undertake  the  trans- 
lation of  the  "  Odyssey,"  which  he  accomplished  with  the 
aid  of  two  young  assistants,  BroAvne  and  Fenton.  For 
the  two  poems  he  received  £9000 — over  £3500  for  the 
"  Odyssey,"  after  paying  Browne  £500  for  doing  eight 
books  and  notes,  though  he  declared,  in  a  note,  that  he 
had  done  but  three  ;  to  Fenton  £200.  He  did  four,  but 
confessed  to  only  two.  This  is  the  first  instance  of  a 
large  sum  being  paid  to  an  author  for  his  work,  and  it 
may  be  compared  with  the  £1200  or  £1300  paid  Dryden 
for  his  "  Virgil." 

This  success  made  Pope's  position  secure.  The  ten 
years'  work  made  him  a  rich  man,  entirely  independent  of 
the  government  and  of  patrons.     As  we  have  seen,  in  the 

*  Tlic  1688  edition  of  Milton  was  one  of  the  first  books  published  in 
this  way.  Drydcn's  "  Virgil  "  and  the  volumes  of  the  Taller  were  also 
published  by  subscription. 

t  For  Tonson,  he  undertook  an  annotated  edition  of  Shaksperc,  also 
published  by  subscription. 


English  Literature.  253 

condition  of  things  at  that  time,  this  was  most  fortunate. 
For  an  additional  j^roof  listen  to  these  lines  of  Swift's, 
from  his  "  Libel  on  the  Rev.  Dr.  Delany  and  Lord  Car- 
teret"  (1729),  ii.  89  : 

"  Deluded  mortals  !  whom  the  great 
Choose  for  companions  tete-a-tete  ; 
Who,  at  their  dinners,  en  fainille, 
Get  leave  to  sit  whene'er  you  will, 
Then  boasting  tell  us  where  you  dined, 
And  how  his  Lordship  was  so  kind  ; 
How  many  pleasant  things  he  spoke. 
And  how  you  laughed  at  every  joke ; 
Swear  he's  a  most  facetious  man, 
That  you  and  he  are  cup  and  can ; 
You  travel  with  a  heavy  load, 
And  quite  mistake  preferment's  road. 
Suppose  my  Lord  and  you  alone, 
Hint  the  least  interest  of  your  own  ; 
His  visage  drops,  he  knits  his  brow, 
He  cannot  talk  of  business  now  : 
Or  mention  but  a  vacant  post. 
He'll  turn  it  off  with, '  Name  your  toast :' 
Nor  could  the  nicest  artist  paint 
A  countenance  with  more  constraint. 

*  *  *  * 

When  wearied  witii  intrigue  of  state 
They  find  an  idle  hour  to  prate. 
Then  should  you  dare  to  ask  a  place. 
You  forfeit  all  your  patron's  grace. 
And  disappoint  the  sole  design 
For  which  he  summoned  you  to  dine. 
Thus  Congreve  spent  in  writing  plays, 
And  one  poor  office  *  half  his  days ; 
While  Montague,  who  claimed  the  station 
To  be  Miecenas  of  the  nation. 
For  poets  open  table  kept. 
But  ne'er  considered  where  they  slept : 

*  Commissioner  for  licensing  coaches. 


2  54  English  Literature. 

Himself  as  rich  as  fifty  Jews 

Was  easy  though  they  wanted  shoes. 


Thus  Steele,  who  owii'd  what  others  writ, 

And  flourish'd  by  imputed  wit, 

From  perils  of  a  hundred  jails. 

Withdrew  to  starve  and  die  in  Wales. 

Thus  Gay,  the  Hare  with  many  friends, 

Twice  seven  long  years  the  Court  attends; 

Who  under  Tales  conveying  truth. 

To  virtue  forra'd  a  princely  youth  :  * 

Who  paid  his  courtship  with  the  crowd 

As  far  as  modest  pride  allowed  ; 

Rejects  a  servile  usher's  f  place, 

And  leaves  St.  James's  in  disgrace. 

Thus  Addison,  by  lords  caressed. 

Was  left  in  foreign  lands  distressed ; 

Forgot  at  home,  became  for  hire 

A  travelling  tutor  to  a  squire ; 

But  wisely  left  the  Muses'  hill, 

To  business  shaped  the  poet's  quill ; 

Let  all  his  barren  laurels  fade : 

Took  up  himself  the  courtier's  trade, 

And,  grown  a  minister  of  state, 

Saw  poets  at  his  levee  wait. 

Hail,  happy  Pope  !  whose  generous  mind 

Detesting  all  the  statesmen  kind. 

Contemning  courts,  at  courts  unseen, 

Refus'd  the  visits  of  a  queen. 

A  soul  with  every  virtue  fraught, 

By  sages,  priests,  or  poets  taught ; 

Whose  filial  piety  excels 

Whatever  Grecian  story  tells  ; 

A  genius  for  all  stations  fit. 

Whose  meanest  talent  is  his  wit ; 

His  heart  too  great,  though  fortune  little. 

To  lick  a  rascal  statesman's  spittle ; 

*  The  young  Duke  of  Cumberland  (1726). 
t  Gentleman  usher  to  the  Princess  Louisa. 


English  Literature.  255 

Appealing  to  the  nation's  taste, 
Above  tlie  reach  of  want  is  placed ; 
By  Homer  dead  was  taught  to  thrive, 
Which  Homer  never  could  alive ; 
And  sits  aloft  on  Pindus'  head. 
Despising  slaves  that  cringe  for  bread." 

The  rest  of  the  poem  is  worth  reading,  for  what  it  shows 
us  of  Swift's  experience  with  courts.*     Swift  had  been  of 

*  "  True  politicians  only  pay 

For  solid  work,  but  not  for  play  ; 

Kor  ever  choose  to  work  with  tools 

Forged  up  in  colleges  and  schools  : 

Consider  how  much  more  is  due 

To  all  their  journeymen  than  you. 

At  table  you  can  Horace  quote, 

They  at  a  pinch  can  bribe  a  vote  : 

You  show  your  skill  in  Grecian  story,* 

But  they  can  manage  Whig  and  Tory: 

You  as  a  critic  are  so  curious 

To  find  a  line  in  Virgil  spurious  ; 

But  they  can  smoke  the  deep  designs, 

When  Bolingbroke  with  Pulteney  dines. 

Besides,  your  patron  may  upbraid  ye. 

That  you  have  got  a  place  already ; 

An  office  for  your  talents  fit, 

To  flatter,  carve  and  show  your  wit, 

To  snuff  the  lights,  and  stir  the  fire. 

And  get  a  dinner  for  your  hire. 

What  claim  have  you  to  place  or  pension  ? 

He  overpays  in  condescension." 

Then,  after  some  bitter  words  on  Walpole,  he  goes  on : 

"  But  I,  .  .  . 

Can  lend  you  an  allusion  fitter  : 
♦  *  *  * 

'  Go  to  aflPect  a  monarch's  ends. 
From  hell  a  viceroy-devil  ascends, — 
His  budget  with  corruptions  crammed, 
The  contributions  of  the  damned, 


256  English  Literature. 

great  service  to  Pope  at  the  beginning  of  his  translation 
in  the  way  of  getting  him  subscribers,  for  he  was  at  that 
time  of  great  influence.  "  He  instructed  a  young  nobleman 
that  the  best  poet  in  England  was  Mr.  Pope,  a  Papist,  who 
had  begun  a  Homer  into  English  verse,  for  which,  he  must 
have  them  all  subscribe, '  for,'  says  he, '  the  author  shall  not 
'begin  to  j)rint,  till  I  have  a  thousand  guineas  for  him.'  " 
You  will  notice  that,  at  the  beginning  of  the  collection  of 
subscribers,  Oxford  and  Bolingbroke  were  in  power,  and 
Swift  was  their  strongest  ally  in  the  press.  When  the  first 
volume  appeared,  1715,  Bolingbroke  was  in  exile,  Oxford 
under  impeachment.  Swift  in  angry  retirement  at  his 
deanery.  Yet  Pope  managed  to  keep  out  of  political 
storms.  He  was  careful  in  this  part  of liis'TiFe  hot  to  ally 
himself  with  one  party,  and  he  kept  himself  free  from 
compromising  dedications,  from  principle  and  doubtless 
from  policy.  In  No.  4  of  the  Guardian,  as  I  have  said,  he 
denounced  the  servility  which  many  literary  men  showed 
in  the  letters  of  dedication,  saying  :  "  This  prostitution  of 
praise  is  not  only  a  deceit  upon  the  gross,  of  mankind, 
who  take  their  notion  of  characters  from  the  learned,  but 
also  the  better  sort  must  by  this  means  lose  some  part  at 
least  of  that  desire  of  fame  which  is  the  incentive  to  gen- 
erous actions.  .  .  ,  Even  truth  itself  in  a  dedication  is  like 


Wliich,  with  unsparing  hand,  he  strows 

Through  courts  and  senates  as  he  goes, 

And  then  at  Beelzebub's  black  hall 

Complains  his  budget  was  too  small.' 

Your  simile  may  better  shine 

In  verse,  but  there  is  truth  in  mine ; 

For  no  imaginable  things 

Can  differ  more  tiian  gods  and  kings, 

And  statesmen  by  ten  thousand  odds 

Are  angels  just  as  king--  are  gods." 


EiiglUh  Literature.  257 

an  honest  man  in  a  disguise  or  vizor-mask,  and  will  appear 
a  cheat  by  being  dressed  so  like  one.  Though  the  merit 
of  the  person  is  beyond  disjjute,  I  see  no  reason  that  be- 
cause one  man  is  eminent,  therefore  another  has  a  right  to 
be  impertinent,  and  throw  praises  in  his  face,"  etc.,  etc. 

When  the  "Iliad"  was  finished,  with  the  sixth  vol- 
ume in  1720,  Pope  dedicated  it  to  neither  Whigs  nor 
Tories,  who  had  been  equally  civil  to  him,  but  to  Con- 
greve,  thus  exhibiting  an  honorable  neutrality.  Before 
this  time,  to  be  sure,  Steele  had  dedicated  "  The  Tender 
Husband"  to  Addison,  1705,  and  Gay,  1713,  his  "Rural 
Sports  "  to  Pope,  but  these  were  less  important.  The 
"  Iliad  "  was,  one  may  almost  say,  a  publication  of  impor- 
tance to  the  whole  nation.  In  his  preface,  too,  which  ap- 
jjeared  in  the  first  volume  in  1715,  he  paid  compliments 
not  only  to  men  of  various  sorts,  but  also  of  different  par- 
ties. "  Mr.  Addison  was  the  first  whose  advice  deter- 
mined me  to  undertake  this  task  ;  who  was  pleased  to 
write  to  me  on  that  occasion  in  such  terms  as  I  cannot  re- 
peat without  vanity.  I  was  obliged  to  Sir  Richard  Steele 
for  a  very  early  recommendation  of  my  work  to  the  pub- 
lic. Dr.  Swift  promoted  my  interest  with  that  warmth 
with  which  he  always  serves  a  friend.  The  humanity  and 
frankness  of  Sir  Samuel  Gai'th  are  what  I  never  knew 
wanting  on  any  occasion.  I  must  acknowledge,  with  in- 
finite pleasure,  the  many  friendly  oftices,  as  well  as  sincere 
criticisms  of  Mr.  Congreve."  "  I  must  add  the  names  of 
Mr.  Rowe,  and  Dr.  Parnell."  "  But  what  can  I  say  of  the 
honor  so  many  of  the  great  have  done  me."  "  His  grace 
the  Duke  of  Buckingham."  "  The  Earl  of  Halifax  was 
one  of  the  first  to  favor  me  ;  of  whom  it  is  hard  to  say 
whether  the  advancement  of  the  polite  arts  is  more  owing 
to  his  generosity  or  his  example."  "Such  a  genius  as  my 
Lord  Bolingbroke,  not  more  distinguished  in  the  great 


258  EngJlsh  Literature. 

scenes  of  business,  than  in  all  the  useful  and  entertaining 
parts  of  learning,  has  not  refused  to  be  the  critic  of  these 
sheets  and  the  patron  of  their  writer  ;  and  that  the  noble 
author  of  the  tragedy  of  '  Heroic  Love,'  George  Gran- 
ville, Lord  Lansdowne,  has  continued  his  partiality  to  me, 
from  my  writing  pastorals  to  my  attempting  the  Iliad." 
And  the  list  might  be  made  longer. 

Of  the  translation  itself  I  shall  not  speak  at  any  length. 
We  have  already  taken  into  consideration  the  style  of  this 
period,  contrasting  it  with  that  which  it  succeeded.  There 
we  saw  how  every  period  demands  its  own  translation  of 
the  great  masterpieces  of  antiquity  and  other  nations  ; 
and  we  compared  Pope's  work  with  Chapman's,  and  that 
of  the  many  of  the  present  time.  I  may  add  here,  that 
the  number  of  the  competitors  for  our  favor  is  another 
proof  of  the  unsettled  condition  of  literature.  We  are  all 
trying  over  the  old  methods  in  the  lack  of  any  great  pres- 
ent inspiration  which  shall  sweep  everything  before  it. 
Since  we  see  nothing  in  the  jiresent,  our  attention  natu- 
rally reverts  to  the  jjast,  and  we  try  to  be  as  simjDle  as  the 
ballad-writers,  or  like  Chaucer,  or  Milton,  or  to  rival  Pope 
—  quot  homines  tot  sententm.  Moreover,  the  tendency 
towards  prose  translations  is  in  obedience  to  the  dictates 
of  precise  scholarship,  and  the  general  despair  of  ever 
finding  a  satisfactory  poetical  form.  In  Pope's  time,  there 
was  no  doubt  about  the  poetical  form  to  be  adopted,  and 
Chapman  had  his  choice  of  all  the  metres. 

III.  When  the  translation  was  finished  Pope  found 
himself  a  rich  man.  He  bought,  in  1719,  his  famous  place 
at  Twickenham,  which,  as  Walpole  said,  he  "  twisted  and 
twirled  and  rhymed  and  harmonized,"  "  till  it  appeared 
two  «)r  three  sweet  little  lawns,  opening  and  opening  be- 
yond one  another,  and  the  whole  surrounded  with  im- 
])eiieti-abli'  woods."     His  life  here  is  to  be  found  described 


English  LiteTature.  259 

in  Mr.  Leslie  Stephen's  volume  in  the  "  English  Men  of 
Letter  Series."  I  will  only  say  here  that  he  lived  in  com- 
fort, or,  as  he  put  it, 

"...  thanks  to  Homer  since  I  live  and  thrive, 
Indebted  to  no  Prince  or  Peer  alive." 

Yet  he  saw  princes  and  peers  in  abundance.  Indeed, 
he  is  said  to  have  fallen  asleep  at  his  own  table  when  the 
Prince  of  Wales  was  talking  to  him,  and  many  of  the 
most  eminent  men  of  England  were  numbered  among  his 
guests.  Such  were  Swift,  Gay,  Atterbury,  Arbuthnot ; 
politicians  like  Bolingbroke,  Murray,  Lyttelton,Wyndham, 
Lord  Oxford,  Lord  Peterborough,  etc.  Later  we  shall 
find  Pope's  exultation  over  the  joys  of  life  as  he  tasted 
them  at  his  villa.  ^Yet  he  was  not  happy,  and  the  cause 
of  his  miJtuippLa££S  was  his  detestation  of  the  poor  writers 
of  his  time.  -This  detestation  he  put  into  verse,  and  the 
"Dunciad"  has  secured  the  unhoped-for  immortality  of 
numerous  petty  writers  of  the  first  half  of  the  last  century. 
Whether  they  were  worth  the  pains  that  were  taken  to 
demolish  them,  is  an  open  question.  The  poem  is  one  of 
the  English  classics,  and  has  been  highly  praised  by  nu- 
merous critics,  yet  the  impression  that  it  leaves  on  the 
reader  is  not  a  pleasant  one.  Pope  would  have  resented 
the  notion  that  he  was  not  a  civilized  writer,  yet  here  we 
find  him  indulging  in  abuse  of  all  sorts  of  j)ersons,  mo¥t" 
of  them  to  the  last  degree  insignificant,  and  those  who 
were  of  importance  were  unjustly  attacked.  Yet,  good  or 
bad,  even  granting  that  they  were  all  bad.  Pope's  temper 
in  this  poem  is  exactly  that  of  the  furious  pamphleteers 
whom  he  wished  to  depose,  of  the  hack-writers  whom  he 
never  looked  upon  as  fellow-beings.  It  has  been  remarked 
by  the  wise  that  the  foolish  are  not  yet  extinct — still  the 
world  has  found  a  modus  vivendl  with  these  people,  and 
has  learned  at  any  rate  to  observe  them  without  excessive 


26o  Enyllsh  Literature. 

loss  of  temper.  They  are  now  as  vexatious,  annoying, 
and  pretentious  as  they  were  in  Pope's  time,  yet  what 
should  we  think  of  a  man  who  devoted  the  best  years  of 
his  life  to  abusing  them  ?  Disproj^ortionate  anger  is  as 
unfortunate  as  disproportionate  enthusiasm,  and  Pope's 
fury  against  incompetence  and  foolishness  is  very  far 
from  the  temper  with  which  a  man  of  the  world,  a  truly 
civilized  person,  regards  these  inevitable  qualities.  If 
he  had  been  galled  by  seeing  folly  rewarded,  incapacity 
triumphant,  there  might  have  been  some  excuse,  but  even 
then  anger  would  not  be  becoming  ;  as  it  was,  however, 
he,  the  leading  literary  man  of  England,  one  might  say 
of  Europe,  went  out  of  his  way  to  attack  a  number  of 
wretched,  scribbling  starvelings,  to  ridicule  some  whose 
only  fault  was  inability  to  do  anything,  and  to  denounce 
others  whom  he^  should  have  had  the  intelligence  to  rate 
higher.  Pope  had  done  much  to  raise  the  tone  of  litera- 
ture ;  he  had  taught  authors  how  they  might  break  with 
servility  and  rise  to  independence,  and  then  at  Jast  b.p 
made  use  of  the  position  he  had  acquired  with  much  honor 
to  throw  discredit  on  letters,  not  so  much  by  exposing 
petty  men  as  by  degrading  himself  to  something  near 
their  level.  This,  of  course,  does  not  apply  to  the  execu- 
tion of  his  work,  but  to  the  rude,  brutal  spirit  that  ani- 
mated it.  Thus  in  the  second  book,  when,  a  monarch  of 
Dulness  having  been  chosen,  games  are  instituted  in  his 
honor — for,  like  everything  else,  the  humor  is  heroic  and 
pseudo-classical.  Some  of  the  games  are  simply  disgust- 
ing, but  one  of  the  least  objectionable  is  thus  described  ; 
Dulness  \vith  her  court  descends 

"  To  wliore  Fleet  Ditcli  with  (lisemboguinji  streams 
Rolls  the  la:-p;e  tribute  of  dead  dogs  to  Thames, 
Tlie  king  of  <lykes  than  wliom  no  sluice  of  mud 
Wiih  deeper  sable  blots  the  silver  flood. 


English  Literature.  261 

'  Here  strip,  my  children  !  here  at  once  leap  in, 
Here  prove  who  best  can  dash  thro'  thick  and  thin, 
And  who  the  most  in  love  of  dirt  excel, 
Or  dark  dexterity  of  groping  well,'  "  etc. 

Here  is  the  description  of  some  who  sought  the  prize, 
"  a  pig  of  lead  to  him  who  dives  the  best :" 

"Next  plmiged  a  feeble,  but  a  desp'rate  pack, 
With  each  a  sickly  brother  at  his  back : 
Sons  of  a  day  !  just  buoyant  on  the  flood, 
Then  numbered  with  the  pu]ipies  in  the  mud. 
Ask  ye  their  names  ?     I  could  as  soon  disclose 
The  names  of  these  blind  puppies  as  of  those." 

Literature  is  scarcely  honored  by  such  support  as  this. 

Pope  always  maintained  that  the  provocation  came 
from  his  enemies,  and  certainly  they  had  adopted  enraging 
measures.  They  said  of  him,  "  he  is  one  whom  God  and 
nature  have  marked  for  want  of  common  honesty  ;"  "  great 
fools  will  be  christened  by  the  names  of  great  poets,  and 
Pope  will  be  called  Homer ;"  "  a  little  abject  thing,"  and 
this  gem  :  "  Let  us  take  the  initial  letter  of  his  Christian 
name,  and  the  initial  and  final  letters  of  his  surname,  viz., 
A,  P,  E,  and  they  give  you  the  same  idea  of  an  Ape  as 
his  face."  "  A  squab  short  gentleman — a  little  creature 
that,  like  the  frog  in  the  fable,  swells  and  is  angry  that  it 
is  not  allowed  to  be  as  big  as  an  ox."  Yet  this  was  but  a 
part  of  the  regular  language  of  the  critics  of  the  day,  and 
called  for  no  especial  answer,  certainly  no  answer  in  kind. 
Dryden  had  been  called  an  ape,  an  ass,  a  frog,  a  coward,  a 
knave,  a  fool  and  a  thing  in  very  much  such  language  as 
that  used  about  Pope.  Thus,  "  Poet  squab  endured  with 
Poet  Maro's  spirit  !  an  ugly  croaking  kind  of  vermin 
which  would  swell  to  the  bulk  of  an  ox."  These  were  the 
words  of  Luke  Milbourne,  a  persistent  foe  of  Dryden,  but 
how  did  Dryden   answer  him?      Li   the  preface  to  his 


262  English  Literature. 

"Fables  "  ("Versions  of  Chaucer,  Boccaccio,  and  Ovid"), 
we  find  this  passage  : 

"  As  a  corollary  to  this  preface,  in  which  I  have  done 
justice  to  others,  I  owe  somewhat  to  myself  :  not  that  1 
think  it  worth  my  time  to  enter  the  lists  with  one  Mil- 
bourn  and  one  Blackmore,  but  barely  to  take  notice  that 
such  men  there  are  who  have  written  scurrilously  against 
me,  without  any  provocation.  Milbourn,  who  is  in  orders, 
pretends  amongst  the  rest  this  quarrel  to  me,  that  I  have 
fallen  foul  on  priesthood  :  if  I  have,  I  am  only  to  ask  par- 
don of  good  priests,  and  am  afraid  his  part  of  the  repara- 
tion will  come  to  little.  Let  him  be  satisfied  that  he  shall 
not  be  able  to  force  himself  upon  me  for  an  adversary.  I 
contemn  him  too  much  to  enter  into  competition  with  him. 
His  own  translations  of  Virgil  have  answered  his  criticisms 
on  mine.  If  (as  they  say,  he  has  declared  in  print)  he  pre- 
fers the  version  of  Ogilby  to  mine,  the  world  has  made 
him  the  same  compliment ;  for  it  is  agreed  on  all  hands, 
that  he  writes  even  below  Ogilby  :  that,  you  will  say,  is 
not  easily  to  be  done  ;  but  what  cannot  Milbourn  bring 
about  ?  I  am  satisfied,  however,  that  while  he  and  I  live 
together,  I  shall  not  be  thought  the  worst  poet  of  the  age. 
It  looks  as  if  I  had  desired  him  underhand  to  write  so  ill 
against  me  ;  but  upon  my  honest  word  I  have  not  bribed 
him  to  do  me  this  service,  and  am  w^holly  guiltless  of  his 
])amphlet.  'Tis  true,  I  should  be  glad,  if  I  could  persuade 
him  to  continue  his  good  offices,  and  write  such  another 
critique  on  anything  of  mine  :  for  I  find  by  experience  he 
has  a  great  stroke  with  the  reader,  when  he  condemns  any 
of  my  poems,  to  make  the  world  have  a  better  opinion  of 
them.  He  has  taken  some  pains  with  my  poetry  ;  but  no- 
body will  be  persuaded  to  take  the  same  with  his.  If  I 
had  taken  to  the  church  (as  lie  affirms,  but  which  was 
never  in  my  thoughts)  I  should  have  had  more  sense,  if 


English  Literature.  263 

not  more  grace,  than  to  have  turned  myself  out  of  my 
benefice  by  writing  libels  on  my  parishioners. — But  his 
account  of  my  manners  and  my  principles  are  of  a  piece 
with  his  cavils  and  his  poetry  :  and  so  I  have  done  with 
him  for  ever." 

Certainly  this  disposes  of  Milbourne  more  completely 
than  does  Pope's  resuscitation  of  him,  and  his  new  ven- 
geance in  the  "  Dunciad,"  when  he  adorns  Smedley,  the 
successful  diver,  with  cassock,  surcingle,  and  vest : 

"  '  Receive,'  he  said,  'these  robes  which  once  were  mine, 
Duhiess  is  sacred  in  a  sound  divine.'  "  * 

Yet  Dryden  had  shown  his  power  of  using  verse  as  a 
means  of  attack,  and  notably  in  the  three  lines  of  brief 
description  of  his  publisher,  Tonson,  which  he  wrote  when 
that  gentleman  had  refused  him  an  advance  of  money  : 

"  With  leering  loolis,  bull-faced,  and  freckled  fair, 
With  two  left  legs,  and  Judas-coloured  f  hair, 
And  frowsy  pores,  that  taint  the  ambient  air." 

"  Tell  the  dog,"  Dryden  said  to  the  messenger,  "  that  he  who 
wrote  these  can  write  more."  But  these  were  sufficient. 
In  his  "Mac  Flecknoe,"  Dryden  set  the  example  of  the 
.satirical  poem  which  Pope  afterwards  followed,  and  in  the 
_second  part  of  the  "  Absalom  and  Achitophel "  he  resumed 
the  attack  on  Shadwell ;  but  Dryden,  in  all  his  attacks, 
preserved  his  self-possession,  his  sujjeriority  to  his  subject, 

*  Vide  Renan :  "  II  y  a  chez  lui  (Lammenais)  trop  de  colere  et  pas 
assez  de  dedain.  Les  consequences  litteraires  de  ce  defaut  sont  fort 
graves.  La  colere  amene  la  declamation,  et  le  mauvais  gout ;  le  dedain, 
au  contraire,  produit  presque  toujours  un  style  delicat.  La  colei'e  a  besoin 
d'etre  partagee  ;  elle  est  indiscrete,  car  elle  veut  se  communiquer.  Le  de- 
dain est  une  fine  et  delicieuse  vohipte  qu'on  savoure  a  soi  seul ;  il  est  dis- 
cret,  car  il  se  suffit"  ("Essais  de  Morale  et  de  Critique,"  p.  188). 

f  "Amboyna,"  act  i.  sc.  i.,  Beaumont  says:  "I  do  not  like  his  oath, 
there's  treachery  in  that  Judas-colour'd  Beard." 


264  English  Literature. 

while  Pope  lost  Lis,  For  Dryden's  coarseness  in  some 
parts  of  his  denunciation  of  his  foes  there  is  more  excuse 
than  for  Pope's,  which  is  less  robust,  and  less  to  be  par- 
doned by  consideration  of  the  usual  language  of  the  time. 
Dryden  retained  his  superiority  to  his  victims,  Pope  low- 
ered himself  to  ribaldry.  Drydrn,  as  I  said,  maintained 
his  self-possession,  and  any  loss  of  self-possession  is  fatal, 
or  at  least  injurious,  to  artistic  performance.  We  do 
not  want  the  actor,*  by  excess  of  emotion,  to  become 
speechless  when  he  should  be  speaking,  or  the  lyric  poet 
to  burst  into  prose,  or  the  painter  to  be  blinded  by  tears 
so  that  he  cannot  distinguish  his  colors  ;  and  especially 
are  we  repelled  when  a  great  man  gives  way  in  public  to 
undue  wrath.  There  is  nothing  dignified  in  anger,  there 
is  dignity  in  self-control  ;  and  the  reader  of  the  "Dun- 
ciad"  is  sure  to  be  struck  by  the  curious  exhibition  it 
offers  us  of  Pope's  state  of  mind  concerning  paltry  writers, 
who  only  needed  to  be  neglected  to  perish. 

All  the  satirical  writers  of  France  and  England  write 
with  a  certain  violence,  as  if  they  composed  their  verses 
to  the  inspiration  of  the  beating  of  a  bass-drum  ;  but  here 
we  have  the  additional  fire  of  wrath  with  unworthy  ob- 
jects. It  will  be  fairer,  however,  to  judge  of  this  from  the 
study  of  the  evidence.  We  shall  then  find,  as  in  nearly 
all  that  Pope  wrote,  abundant  example  of  his  wit  and  in- 
genuity. Dryden,  it  will  be  remembered,  celebrates  the 
appointment  of  Elkanah  Shadwell  as  Flecknoe's  successor 
on  the  throne  of  the  kingdom  of  Dulness,  and  he  describes 
the  ceremonies  at  his  coronation.  Pope  chose  for  his  suc- 
cessor Theobald,  the  first  writer  on  Shakspere  who  took 
the  pains  of  studying  the  contemporary  literature.     Pope 

*  Vide  Diderot,  "  Paradoxe,"  viii.  384,  and  Lessinj^,  "  natuburger  Drama- 
turgic "  (3""  Stiick).  Mis.  Kcnibli^  lias  also  some  iuteiestiug  remarks  on 
the  subject  in  her  "Recoids  of  a  (iirlhood,"  p.  2-16. 


E'nglish  Literature.  265 

had  himself  prepared  an  edition  of  Shakspere  ;  it  appeared 
in  six  large  quarto  volumes,  for  which  Pope  received 
£217  125.  The  work  was  sold  at  first  for  a  guinea  a  vol- 
ume, but  out  of  the  seven  hundred  and  fifty  copies  printed 
one  hundred  and  forty  remained  unsold,  and  were  disposed 
of  at  16s.  apiece.  Pope's  work  as  an  editor  was  value- 
less. He,  to  be  sure,  said  some  good  things  in  his  pref- 
ace,* where  he  gave  evidence  of  very  sincere  and  warm 
admiration  for  Shakspere.  His  plays,  compared  with  those 
of  modern  times,  are,  he  says,  like  an  "  ancient,  majestic 
piece  of  Gothick  architecture,  compared  with  a  neat  modern 
building  :  the  latter  is  more  elegant  and  glaring,  but  the 
former  is  more  strong  and  more  solemn."  His  emenda- 
tions are  worthless.  Thus  he  is  amazed  by  Shakspere's 
frequent  use  of  the  double  comparative,  as  "more  bet- 
ter," which  Theobald  showed  was  not  a  misreading  ;  and 
the  best  proof  of  Theobald's  accuracy,  though  he  did  not 
go  far,  is  this,  that  Warburton,  Pope's  editor  and  admirer, 
accepted  many  of  his  suggestions  in  the  revision  of  Pope's 
edition.  Pope,  too,  marked  with  quotation-marks  all  the 
lines  that  seemed  to  him  particularly  fine.  Theobald 
naturally  incurred  Pope's  particular  hostility  by  criticis- 
ing his  Shakspere,  and  was  first  chosen  for  the  favorite  of 
Dulness  ;  but  afterwards,  in  a  later  edition  (1743),  he  was 
deposed  and  Colley  Gibber  was  put  in  his  place.  Cibber 
was  a  wu-iter  of  light  and  somewhat  amusing  plays,  and  of 
an  '  Apology '  for  his  own  life,  which  is  still  entertaining. 
As  Mr.  Leslie  Stephen  states  it :  "  Pope  owed  him  a  grudge. 
Cibber,  in  playing  the  '  Rehearsal,'  had  introduced  some 
ridicule  of  the  unlucky  'Three  Hours  after  Marriage.' 
Pope,  he  says,  came  behind  the  scenes  foaming  and 
choking  with  fury,  and  forbidding  Cibber  ever  to  repeat 

*  "To  judge,  therefore,  of  Shakespeare  by  Aristotle's  rules  is  like  trying 
a  man  by  the  laws  of  one  country  who  acted  under  those  of  another." 

12 


266  English  Literature. 

the  insult.  Cibber  laughed  at  him,  said  that  he  would  re- 
peat it  as  long  as  the  '  Rehearsal '  Avas  played,  and  kept 
iiis  word.  Pope  took  his  revenge  by  many  incidental  hits 
at  Cibber,  and  Cibber  made  a  good-humoured  reference  to 
this  abuse  in  the  'Apology.'  Thereupon  Pope,  in  the  new 
'  Dunciad,'  described  him  as  laughing  on  the  lajj  of  the 
goddess,  and  added  various  personalities  in  the  notes. 
Cibber  straightway  published  a  letter  to  Pope,  the  more 
cutting  because  still  in  perfect  good-humour,  and  told  the 
story  about  the  original  quarrel.  He  added  an  irritating 
anecdote  in  order  to  provoke  the  poet  still  further.  .  .  . 
The  two  Richardsons  once  found  Pope  reading  one  of 
Cibber's  pamphlets.  lie  said, '  These  things  are  my  diver- 
sion ;'  but  they  saw  his  features  writhing  with  anguish, 
and  young  Richardson,  as  they  went  home,  observed  to 
his  father  that  he  hoped  to  be  preserved  from  such  diver- 
sions as  Pope  had  enjoyed."  The  change  showed  more 
bad  temper  than  judgment.  Theobald,  although  chosen 
for  an  unworthy  motive,  was  undeniably  dull,  but  Cibber, 
who  was  selected  for  the  same  reason,  was  certainly  not 
dull.  If  he  had  been,  he  would  have  been  overlooked.  To 
us  of  a  later  generation,  there  is  not  only  a  feeling  of  dis- 
appointment in  seeing  this  man  of  genius  killing  flies  with 
fury,  there  is  also  a  wearisome  monotony  about  the  flies 
he  has  killed,  as  we  see  them  pinned  to  the  pages  of  the 
"Dunciad."  Shoals  of  notes  are  necessary  to  explain  who 
Smedley  is,  who  Concanen,  who  Osborne,  who  Arnall,  and 
when  we  have  learned  who  they  all  are  we  cannot  care  for 
the  uninteresting  collection.  Doubtless  the  buzz  of  this 
one,  or  the  persistent  return  of  .the  other  to  the  galled 
spot,  was  enraging,  but  there  is  little  profit  for  us  in  hear- 
ing how  this  one  infuriated  Pope,  or  what  a  torment  the 
other  was.  Two  lines  are  devoted  to  one  man,  named 
Ralj^h— 


English  Literature.  26 j 

"  Silence,  ye  wolves,  while  Ralph  to  Cynthia  howls, 
And  makes  night  hideous ;  answer  him,  ye  owls," — 

whose  early  attempts  at  writing  poetry  are  mentioned  in 
Franklin's  too  brief  autobiography.  Bentley,  who  was  a 
great  scholar  —  indeed,  one  of  the  last  of  great  English 
scholars — is  attacked  as  if  he  were  wretchedly  incompe- 
tent, and  put  in  the  same  line  with  the  other  men  who 
were  really  worthless.  I  have  spoken  of  the  first  two 
books  ;  in  the  third  is  a  description  of  the  impending  rule 
of  dulness  over  the  world,  and  especially  over  Great  Brit- 
ain (ii.  178).  The  fourth  book  was  added  under  Warbur- 
ton's  influence.  It  turned  to  ridicule  pedants  and  people 
interested  in  collecting  memorials  of  the  past,  a  pursuit 
that  was  then  looked  upon  as  proof  of  a  morbid  taste  ;  but 
it  is  confused,  and,  to  our  thinking,  it  shares  the  fault  it 
denounces  by  being  dull.  The  book  and  the  poem  ends 
with  the  famous  a^DOstrophe,  which  Pope  could  not  repeat 
without  emotion,  and  which  has  been  warmly  admired  by 
Dr.  Johnson  and  Thackeray.  Thackeray,  indeed,  went  so 
far  as  to  say  "no  poet's  verse  ever  mounted  higher  than 
that  wonderful  flight  with  which  the  '  Dunciad '  con- 
cludes :" 

"  She  comes,  she  comes !  the  sable  throne  behold 
Of  night  primeval  and  of  chaos  old,"  etc.  (ii.  199). 

Certainly  such  praise  seems  strange.  I  will  not  go  into 
any  description  of  the  torrent  of  abuse  which  this  poem, 
not  unnaturally,  brought  down  on  Pope's  head.  Many  of 
the  people  whom  he  attacked  retorted  in  kind,  and  litera- 
ture was  still  further  defiled  by  a  multitude  of  squibs  in 
denunciation  of  this  abusive  poet.  As  we  have  seen,  the 
poem  occupied  him  more  or  less  for  nearly  the  last  twenty 
years  of  his  life,  and  Pope  was  continually  adding  new 
names  and  new  notes  to  this  Rogues'  Gallery,  proving  that 
the  other  boy  began  the  quarrel,  and  urging  that  other 


268  English  Literature. 

poets  of  acknowledged  fame  had  also  risen  in  their  might 
against  their  persecutors,  but  none  of  them  had  so  far 
shared  the  errors  he  condemned  as  Pope  did.  Boileau  had 
spoken  with  severity,  and  Regnier  with  frankness,  but  nei- 
ther with  the  cold  grossness  which  mars  the  "Dunciad," 
which,  in  spite  of  its  occasional  clever  lines,  is  a  blot  on 
the  literature  of  the  time — a  proof  of  the  thinness  of  the 
polish  on  which  they  prided  themselves.  There  breathes 
through  the  poem  not  merely  Swift's  coarseness,  but  the 
brutal  spirit  which  darkens  the  middle  of  the  last  century 
— the  same  thing  which  stained  the  comedy  of  the  Res- 
toration, faded  away  under  Addison's  influence,  and  ap- 
peared again  here,  and  in  some  of  the  novels  of  the  period 
that  was  then  opening.  The  whole  movement  in  England 
towards  this  pseudo-classicism  did  not  properly  agree  with 
the  conditions  of  the  native  English  spirit.  We  have  seen 
how  in  Addison  it  was  an  artificial  rule  imposing  on  a  man 
of  the  best  natural  taste,  and  in  Pope's  "Dunciad"  it 
showed  most  lamentably  its  incapacity  to  purge  the  Eng- 
lishman of  his  innate  tendencies.  The  proper  home — by 
adoption,  to  be  sure — of  the  whole  change  Avas  France. 
It  was  an  exotic  in  England. 

IV.  Yet  what  England  failed  to  attain  in  literary  pol- 
ish— and  Pope  cannot  be  said  to  be  wanting  in  this — it 
made  up  in  the  acquisition  of  certain  things  which  were 
of  more  importance  in  the  development  of  civilization. 
The  freedom  which  England  won  by  the  Revolution  of 
1688  made  it  the  home  of  philosophical  thought.  France 
and  England  were  at  that  time  the  leading  intellectual 
centres  of  Europe,  and  so  of  the  world.  Italy  was  sunk 
in  sloth  and  intellectual  torpor.  Between  1450  and  1525 
it  had  discovered  the  glories  of  Greek  art  and  litera- 
ture, and  had  communicated  its  knowledge  to  Europe. 
What  the  Renaissance  in  Italy  did  was  to  re-establish  the 


English  Literature.  269 

dignity,  the  importance  of  human  nature,  and  to  break 
with  the  absolutism  of  the  Middle  Ages.  Before  its 
splendor  ceased,  it,  as  we  saw,  fell  to  worshipping  Latin 
models,  and  it  taught  this  less  important  lesson  to  neigh- 
boring countries.  Then,  as  an  Italian  writer,  Algarotti, 
said  of  his  nation,  "  the  one  who  had  got  up  early  before 
the  others,  and  drudged  a  good  deal,  might  rest  somewhat 
in  the  daytime."  But  the  artistic  enjoyment  of  life  that 
fascinated  Italy  was  followed  by  a  strong  reaction  in  favor 
of  authority,  and  this  was  most  strongly  exj^ressed  by 
Spain,  where  the  literary  rules  which  arose  in  Italy  took 
the  least  hold  on  the  writers.  Spain,  by  means  of  the 
Jesuitism  which  was  the  Catholic  counter  -  wave  to  the 
Reformation,  asserted  the  divine  right  of  monarchy,  and 
freedom  was  crushed  out  of  the  greater  part  of  Europe. 
As  Hillebrand  *  says,  "  Think  of  the  difference  between 
the  mediieval  conception  of  sovereignty  and  the  one  which 
was  the  soul  of  Louis  XIV.,  nay,  even  of  the  Protestant 
James  I.  of  England,  and  down  to  the  smallest  German 
and  Italian  princelings  of  that  time  ;  between  the  vanity 
of  the  feudal  royalty  of  the  Middle  Ages,  with  its  almost 
independent  vassals,  and  the  uniformity  of  the  modern 
monarchy  with  its  passive  obedience  and  its  VEtat  c'est 
moi.''''  The  failure  of  the  Spanish  Armada  in  1588  pre- 
served the  freedom  of  England  from  the  direct  yoke  of 
Spain,  and  although  its  literary  influence,  as  we  have  seen 
it  in  Euphuism,  and  in  the  long  romances,  was  consider- 
able— and,  for  that  matter,  we  shall  soon  see  it  again  when 
we  come  to  study  the  origin  of  the  English  novel — in 
England  the  absolutism  of  monarchs  was  completely  over- 
thrown by  the  revolution  of  1688.  England  remained  free 
to  scientific  workmen,  and  freedom  is  the  very  breath  of 

*  Vide  his  invalaable  "  History  of  German  Thought "  (Amer.  ed.),  p.  10 
et  seq. 


270  English  Literature. 

scientific  work.  The  English  philosophy,  from  Bacon  to 
Newton  and  Locke,  was  what  inspired  the  French  litera- 
ture of  the  last  century.  In  England  itself  it  had  less 
influence  on  the  literature.  Various  causes  combined  to 
bring  about  this  result.  For  one  thing,  all  the  most  fa- 
mous French  writers  of  the  last  century  were  interested 
in  philosophy,  and  they  carried  out  the  English  notions 
with  a  relentless  logic  that  soon  transported  them  into  a 
sort  of  pure  ether  out  of  a  world  which  has  no  such  easy 
solution  for  its  problems  as  logic,  while  in  England  the 
test  of  suitability  of  the  philosophy  to  practical  affairs 
was  continually  applied.  ^Another  interesting  contribu- 
tion to  literature  from  England  was  the  appearance,  early 
in  the  last  century,  of  the  love  of  nature  which  we  shall 
soon  begin  to  trace,  and  the  assertion  of  the  people,  as 
distinguished  from  a  literary  circle^  in  literature.  The 
pseudo-classicism  which  we  have  been  studying  did  not 
recognize  anything  but  a  cultivated  class.  Literature  was 
a  freemasonry  of  Avhich  the  founders  were  Horace  and  an 
imaginary  Aristotle.  The  populace  was  merely  a  dim 
background  against  which  were  to  be  seen  kings  and 
lords,  who  were  studied  by  men  of  letters.  Even  now  the 
literary  class  is  derided  by  men  of  action,  as  a  collection 
of  useless  idlers,  and  the  feeling  was  much  more  natural 
one  hundred  and  fifty  years  ago.  But  in  England  and 
Spain  the  influence  of  the  Roman  classicism  was  weaker 
tlian  elsewhere.  In  Spain,  the  people  were  kept  in  subjec- 
tion by  the  reactionary  rule  of  a  priesthood  which  stamped 
out  all  the  Spanish  love  of  adventure  and  conquest  to- 
gether with  literature  and  the  arts,  just  as  Puritanism  in 
England  threw  back  the  fine  arts  and  endangered  the  free 
growth  of  literature  for  a  long  time,  but  the  natural  yearn- 
ing of  the  populace  for  literary  expression  was  not  wholly 
lost.     There  was  bigotry,  and  there  was  enthusiasm,  too, 


English  Literature.  271 

which  conquered  classicism,  and  English  literature  rose  in 
power  from  the  French  rules  that  for  some  time  seemed 
to  the  careless  observer  to  be  triumphant. 

The  empirical  philosophy  inspired  a  sort  of  free  thought, 
as  was  inevitable.  Europe,  in  breaking  with  the  Middle 
Ages,  gave  a  violent  wrench  to  the  continuity  of  the 
Church  of  Rome.  While  every  century  brings  forth  some 
new  peril  to  an  historic  Church,  it  brings,  too,  the  added 
weight  of  greater  antiquity  ;  the  Church  can  point  back 
to  a  greater  past  ;  it  accumulates  dignity.  Even  heretics 
cannot  look  with  indifference  on  the  long  history  of 
Catholicism.  Its  age  alone  inspires  reverence.  Suddenly, 
however,  a  remoter  past  was  discovered  with  qualities  in 
which  Christianity  had  no  share,  and  old  beliefs  were 
quickly  shattered,  or  at  least  shaken.  We  nowadays  have 
learned  to  respect  history,  but  in  Pope's  time  history 
meant  a  record  of  degradation  ;  the  Middle  Ages  were  a 
black  chasm  between  two  periods  of  light — its  learning 
was  but  the  mumbling  of  ignorance,  its  religion,  supersti- 
tion. The  populace,  we  must  understand,  was  unconscious 
of  these  discoveries,  but  the  cultivated  felt  them  most 
keenly.  It  is  no  wonder  that  the  Jesuits  regarded  the 
new  learning  with  abhorrence  ;  in  their  eyes  it  was  full  of 
mischief  to  all  that  they  held  dear.  In  Italy,  the  Church 
had  been  carried  away  by  the  sweetness  of  the  new 
pleasure-loving  creed,  but  it  was  soon  called  to  a  sense  of 
its  responsibilities.  In  France  and  Germany,  religious 
wars  raged  for  a  long  time.  In  England,  when  the 
Reformation  was  complete,  religion  found  itself  con- 
fronted by  the  new  spirit  which  questioned,  by  the  new 
doubts  of  men  who  could  find  no  authority  in  the  past. 
They  had  to  draw  their  reasons  from  recent  discoveries  ; 
the  old,  uninquiring  faith  was  gone,  they  were  forming  a 
new  creed  :  "Philosophy,  hitherto  in  alliance  with  Chris- 


272  English  Literature. 

tianity,  began  to  show  indications  of  a  possible  divorce. 
Though  phik)soj)hers  might  use  the  old  language,  it 
became  daily  more  difficult  to  identify  the  God  of  phi- 
losophy with  the  God  of  Christianity.  How  could  the 
tutelary  deity  of  a  petty  tribe  be  the  God  who  ruled  over 
all  things  and  all  men  ?  How  could  even  the  God  of  the 
mediaeval  imagination,  the  God  worshipped  by  Christians 
when  Christendom  was  regarded  as  approximately  identi- 
cal with  the  universe,  be  still  the  ruler  of  the  whole  earth, 
in  which  Christians  formed  but  a  small  minority,  and  of 
the  universe,  in  which  the  earth  was  but  as  a  grain  of 
sand  on  the  seashore  ?  Or  how,  again,  could  the  personal 
Deity,  whose  atti-ibutes  and  history  were  known  by  tradi- 
tion, be  the  God  whose  existence  was  inferred  by  philoso- 
phers from  the  general  order  of  the  universe  ;  or  regarded 
as  a  necessary  postulate  for  the  discovery  of  all  truth  ? 
If  there  was  no  absolute  logical  conflict  between  the  two 
views,  the  two  modes  of  conceiving  the  universe  refused  to 
coalesce  in  the  imagination."*  Moreover,  as  Mr.  Stephen 
goes  on  to  show,  "  the  great  astronomical  and  geographi- 
cal discoveries  enlarged  men's  conceptions  of  the  Infinite." 
The  world  became  acquainted  with  the  fact  that  there 
were  three  hundred  million  Chinese  who,  it  was  tauntingly 
asserted,  would  be  damned  because  "  they  knew  nothing 
of  an  event  which,  so  far  as  they  were  concerned,  might 
as  well  have  happened  on  the  moon."  The  vast  majesty 
of  the  universe  was  unfolded  to  men  who,  as  Mr.  Stephen 
says,  had  hitherto  been  able  to  "  think  of  their  little 
planet  as  itself  the  universe,  consisting  of  a  little  plain, 
a  few  miles  in  breadth,  and  roofed  by  the  solid  vault  car- 
rying our  convenient  lighting  apparatus.  .  .  .  Through 

*  Vide  L.  Stephen's  "History  of  English  Tiiouglit  in  tlie  Eighteenth 
Century,"  i.  81,  etc. 


English  Literature.  273 

the  roof  of  the  little  theatre  on  which  the  drama  of  man's 
history  had  been  enacted,  men  began  to  see  the  eternal 
stars  shining  in  silent  contemjjt  upon  their  petty  imagin- 
ings." 1  The  question  was  how  to  combine  nature,  as  it 
was_SD  i^iidlyLjinfoIded,~\yrtTrTlie'old  creed.  THe"^ whole' 
controversy  cannot  be  described  here — perhaps  the  best 
account  of  it  is  to  be  found  in  the  book  from  Avhich  I 
have  been  quoting,  Leslie  Stephen's  "  History  of  English 
Thought  in  the  Eighteenth  Century."  \Ve  have  to  do 
with  but  a  small  part  of  it — namely,  that  part  which  in- 
spired Pope's  "  Essay  on  Man." 

The  Deists  in  England  who  led  the  attack  on  orthodoxy 
were  a  despised  set.  Newton,  after  his  astronomical  dis- 
coveries, and  his  assertion,  since  confirmed  by  the  spectro- 
scope, that  probably  all  the  celestial  bodies  were  composed 
of  substances  like  those  known  in  the  earth,  devoted  him- 
self to  the  interpretation  of  the  prophecies.  All  the  great 
men,*  with  scarcely  an  exception,  devoted  themselves  to 
upholding  the  orthodox  belief,  to  reconciling  it  with  the 
new  discoveries,  and  they  were  attacked  only  by  obscure 
writers,  whose  morals  and  manners  condemned  their  argu- 
ments, who  were  detested  for  their  vulgarity.  Even 
Addison  forgot  some  of  his  urbanity  in  speaking  of  them 
{Spectator,  No.  186).  Swift  mentioned  them  with  con- 
tempt ;  and  in  the  "  Dunciad  "  Pope  hurled  scorn  at  them, 
but  in  time  he  came  under  the  influence  of  Lord  Boling- 
broke,  and  was  fascinated  by  that  nobleman's  philosophy. 
Bolingbroke  wrote  down  his  views  on  religious  matters 
when  the  religious  controversy  was  over,  and  his  position 
saved  him  from  contempt,  but  his  immunity  was  especial- 
ly due  to  the  fact  that  the  question  had  ceased  to  be  a 
burning  one.     Pope  was  a  free-thinker,  although  he  de- 


*  Locke,  Bishop  Butler,  Berkeley,  Bentley,  Waterland,  and  Warburton. 

12* 


274  English  Literature. 

tested  the  avowed  free-thinkers.  There  is  no  inexplicable 
inconsistency  in  this  :  of  course,  not  all  of  the  English 
members  of  Parliament  who  vote  against  the  admission  of 
Mr.  Bradlaugh  would  consent  to  be  burned  at  the  stake  in 
defence  of  the  Church  of  England.  Pope's  Catholicism 
sat  lightly  on  him,  and  he  was  familiar  with  the  intel- 
lectual movement  of  his  time,  which  had  been  caught  in 
snatches  by  the  earlier  deists  and  put  to  such  ignoble 
use  as  the  ridicule  or  demolition  of  stray  texts.  Boling- 
broke's  inspiration  in  the  "  Essay  on  Man  "  is  well  known, 
and  some  commentators  have  gone  to  work  to  show  how 
great  is  Pope's  indebtedness  to  his  friend,  even  in  the 
very  matter  of  language,  for  half  lines  are  often  found  in 
the  poem  which  were  taken  from  Bolingbroke's  prose. 
He  borrowed  thoughts  and  phrases,  too,  from  Shaftes- 
bury. One  example  out  of  many  is  to  be  found  in  Leslie 
Stephen's  "Pope"  (p.  167),  and  more  examples  are  given 
in  Elwyn's  notes.  These  need  not  occupy  us.  The  poem 
\/  is  chiefly  interesting  as  a  readable  statement  of  the  form 
which  infidelity  took  in  the  minds  of  some  English  thinkers 
of  the  last  century.  It  is  an  exceedingly  inconsistent 
statement,  because  what  Bolingbroke  had  gathered  rather 
at  random  was  further  confused  by  Pope's  disinclination 
to  thorough  systemization,  and  by  his  aversion  to  open  in- 
fidelity, which  in  England  especially  has  always  implied 
contempt  for  the  social  system.  That  Pope  was  greatly 
agitated  by  the  accusations  of  infidelity  that  were  brought 
against  the  poem  is  well  known.  He  did  not  publish  it 
under  his  name  at  first,  but  waited  to  observe  the  effect  it 
might  have  on  the  public.  Yet  it  is  not  surjirising  that  the 
general  public  failed  to  detect  the  deism  of  the  "  Essay," 
because  not  only  are  there  inconsistencies  in  the  poem, 
but  there  are  many  passages  of  such  brilliant  and  eloquent 
appeal  in  behalf  of  virtue  that  they  might  well  disarm 


English  Literature. 


-Vd 


criticism.  It  was  far  from  being  a  religious  poem,  like 
the  "  Paradise  Lost."  It  was  an  attempt,  as  Pope  said, 
"  to  vindicate  the  ways  of  God  to  man."  *  We  can  see 
by  the  "  Essay  on  Man "  how  the  horizon  had  been 
widened  by  the  many  discoveries,  and  the  consequent 
discussions.  Whatever  may  have  been  the  condition 
of  Bolingbroke's  mind.  Pope's  was  in  a  state  of  flux 
concerning  the  subjects  he  treated  in  this  poem.  As 
Mr.  Stephen  says,  "  Pope  felt  and  thought  by  shocks  and 
electric  flashes."  Hence  he  accumulated  a  number  of 
heterogeneous  thoughts,  from  which  no  coherent,  system 
can  be  formed.  After  all,  it  makes  little  difference  what 
a  poet  writing  on  such  a  subject  believes;  what  makes  a 
poem  is  the  clearness  and  fervor  with  which  he  expresses 
what  he  has  to  say,  whether  his  message  be  one  of  hope 
or  of  hate,  of  belief  or  doubt,  of  optimism  or  pessimism. 
Pope  lacked  any  animating  belief  ;  he  was  impressed  by  a 
number  of  theories  that  were  in  the  air  and  that  he  had 
come  across  in  his  reading,  and  he  had  a  wonderful  gift  of 
expression.  Consequently  we  find  some  of  the  common- 
places of  his  day  admirably  stated. 

Every  reader  has  noticed  the  extreme  cleverness  with 
which  Pope  puts  many  of  the  disconnected  thoughts  of 
the  "  Essay,"  and  this  success  has  kept  it  alive  to  the  pres- 
ent day.  In  its  time  it  was  accused  of  unorthodoxy  and 
of  incoherency,  but  the  energy  of  the  best  passages  has 
always  found  admirers.  They  are  still  j^art  of  the  classics 
of  the  language. 

Pope's  literary  workmanship  was  always  good,  but  the 
taste  of  the  present  time  requires  cooler  praise  to  be  given 
to  the  total  performance.     Where  he  is  first  is  in  his  epis- 

*  Milton,  "Paradise  Lost,"  i.  26,  had  said,  "Justify  the  ways  of  God  to 
man." 


276  English  Literature. 

ties  and  satires,  altbougli  at  times  even  here,  as  in  the 
"  Dunciad,"  he  is  open  to  the  charge  of  finding  fault  with 
poverty  rather  than  with  more  serious  crimes,  and  of  con- 
demning opposing  politicians  with  more  malice  than  wis- 
dom. Still,  our  withers  are  unwrung,  and  we  may  get  an 
excellent  notion  of  the  heat  of  political  feeling  at  the  time 
of  Walpole's  administration,  and  of  the  social  gossip  at 
that  time,  from  these  pages,  which  supplement  the  me- 
moirs of  Pope's  contemporaries. 

We  notice  that  these  satires  are  very  unlike  the  rugged 
Juvenalian  satires  of  the  earlier  English  poets.  The  model 
which  had  the  most  influence  on  Pope  was  the  work  of 
Boileau,  whose  collected  w^orks  were  put  into  English  in 
1708.  Boileau  adopted  the  Horatian  form,  and  his  satires 
and  epistles  are  full  of  translations  from  Horace,  with  ap- 
plication to  contemporary  persons  and  matters.  Pope's 
l^redecessors  —  Hall,  Donne,  and  Oldham  —  were  inspired 
by  a  sort  of  assumed  indignation  against  crimes  which 
they  exaggerated  with  theatrical  fury.  Pope  w^as  inspired 
by  genuine  feeling,  even  though  we  may  perceive  that  his 
anger  was,  as  Mr.  Mark  Pattison  says,  perverse  and  one- 
sided. He  always  had  a  concrete  object  for  his  wrath  ; 
he  did  not  build  up  men  of  straw  to  knock  down  Avith  fine- 
sounding  lines.  Yot,  to  quote  again  from  Mr.  Pattison, 
"That  poetry  which  is  to  be  permanent  must  deal  with 
permanent  themes.  Satirical  is  not  more  than  any  other 
poetry  absolved  from  this  obligation.  Satire,  even  when 
individual,  must  never  lose  sight  of  just  and  noble  ends. 
Of  all  petty  things  nothing  is  so  petty  as  a  petty  quarrel. 
Pope  too  often  allows  the  personal  grudge  to  be  seen 
through  the  service  of  public  police  which  he  puts  on  his 
work.  He  tries  to  make  us  think  he  is  descending  from 
a  superior  sphere  to  lash  scribblers,  who  had  not  only 
sinned  against  taste  by  their  foolish  verses,  but  had  out- 


English  Literature.  277 

raged  his  moral  sense  by  the  scandalousness  of  their  lives. 
.  .  .  The  thin  disguise  of  offended  virtue  is  too  often  a 
cloak  for  revenge.  His  most  pungent  verses  can  always 
be  referred  back  to  some  personal  cause  of  affront — a  line 
in  The  Bee,*  or  a  copy  of  verses  upon  him  which  was 
handed  about  in  manuscript.  He  knowingly  threw  away 
fame  to  indulge  his  piques." 

It  was  in  this  part  of  Pope's  work  that  the  French  influ- 
ence is  most  clearly  visible.  The  tendency  to  modernize 
the  classic  poets  had  already  appeared.  Oldham's  versions 
of  Juvenal  and  Horace  with  contemporary  references,  and 
Dryden's  version  of  Boileau's  "  L'Art  Poetique,"  were  ex- 
amples of  this  tendency  to  apply  foreign  poems  to  domes- 
tic circumstances.  Rochester's  "  Allusion  to  the  Tenth 
Satire  of  the  Fifth  Book  of  Horace  "  was  the  first  regular 
example  in  English  of  what  Pope  afterwards  brought  to 
perfection.  In  France,  satire  had  found  a  home  where  it 
flourished  even  more  than  in  England.  The  first  to  intro- 
duce there  this  method  of  writing  was  Yauquelin  de  la 
Fresnaie  (published  1612),  who  declared:  "Done  il  ne 
faut  douter  que  la  Satyre  ne  soit  une  espece  de  poesie,  qui 
sera  merveilleusement  plaisante  et  profitable  en  nostre 
Fran9ois,  pouveu  qu'on  s'abstienne  de  diffamer  personne 
en  particulier,  et  qu'on  ne  se  licentie  par  vengeance  on 
autrement  a  faire  des  vers  pleins  de  medisance,  d'iniure, 
et  de  menterie,  tels  que  sont  les  Cocqs-a-1'Asne  "  (i.  130). 
Yet  Vauquelin's  numerous  satires  have  more  historical 
than  poetical  value  ;  they  lack  the  vigor  of  those  of 
D'Aubigne's,  and  the  animation  of  Regnier's.  We  notice 
in  France  the  swiftness  with  which  that  country  became 
civilized  after  the  long  wars  of  the  sixteenth  century. 
"We  find  Corneille  and  Racine  almost  treading  on  the  heels 

*  A  weekly  pamphlet  for  which  Budgell  {inter  alios)  wrote. 


2/8  English  Literature. 

of  Hardy,  just  as  in  England  we  see  the  Spectator  and 
Pope's  neat  verse  following  a  rugged  past.  This  will  show 
us  how  eager  was  the  yearning,  of  cultivated  men  at  least, 
for  civilization.  Boileau  was  a  most  useful  ally  in  clear- 
ing away  the  encumbrances  of  the  past,  and  his  satirical 
poems  still  remain  as  models  of  neat  and  dexterous  verse. 
The  best  qualities  of  Pope^^ondensation  and  intellectual 
clearness — we  find  in  BoileauTwEo'lacks  Pope's  occasional 
roughness-  of  temper  and  personal  bias.  How  good  Pope 
was  at  his  best  we  may  see  in  the  "  Epistle  to  Dr.  Arbuth- 
not,"  which  is  really  Pope's  masterpiece. 

Since  Boileau's  and  Pope's  satirical  writings,  in  spite 
of  great  changes  in  the  popular  taste,  still  hold  their  place 
as  classics,  we  may  form  a  more  complete  notion  of  their 
success  in  their  own  day,  when  these  two  writers  said  in 
the  best  form  what  their  contemporaries  were  most  anx- 
ious to  hear.  Boileau's  message  on  literary  matters  was 
almost  omnipotent  in  France,  and  through  France  almost 
everywhere  in  Europe,  until  a  comparatively  recent  time  ; 
and  though  in  his  own  country,  since  the  outbreak  of  ro- 
manticism, his  reputation  has  suffered,  his  great  literary 
skill  is  still  admired.  Of  course  it  is  not  merely  his  word 
that  controlled  the  taste  of  this  great  people — he  was  but 
the  best  mouthpiece  of  the  prevailing  sentiments  ;  but  his 
wit  and  skill  lent  additional  force  to  what  he  had  to  say. 
In  very  much  the  same  way  Pope's  name  is  given  to  the 
whole  of  the  English  literary  movement  of  the  last  cen- 
tury, though  with  great  inaccuracy,  as  I  shall  presently 
try  to  _shQW.  ^Sinca  both  these  writers  especially  distin- 
guished themselves  in  satirical  poetry,  one  cannot  help 
35-054eDIlg.  ^"hat  it  was  in  the  conditions  of  their  times 
that_HLade_satii:£-£i),powerful  a  weapon.  A  satirist  nowa- 
days— one  who  should  write  in  verse,  at  least — would  be 
laughed  at  for  his  pains.     This  jPorm  of  writing jg^s  sub- 


English  Literature.  279 

sequently  tried,  to  be  sure,  by  Gifford  in  his  "  Baviad " 
and  his  "  Mseviad,"  by  Byron  in  his  "  English  Bards  and 
Scotch  Reviewers,"  to  mention  the  most  prominent  exam- 
ples, but  these  writers  only  galvanized  what  was  a  dead 
form.  An  attack  on  the  satir^e^  j^§!i.j?6en_  already  made 
by  Bowles  in  his  edition  of  Pope  (1V97),  when  he  asked 
w^hether  the  attitude  of  the  satirist  is  one  which  any  indi- 
vidual can  assume  towards  his  fellow-men.  This  attitude  ^ 
of  condemnation  of  our  fellow-men  is  taken  by  every  per- 
son living,  at  home  and  abroad,  in  private  talk,  in  letters, 
and  in  public  writing,  but  its  mode  of  expressing  itself  is 
changed.  Mr.  Pattison  says  that  just  as  the  prophet  comes 
forward  to  rebuke  sin,  so  does  the  satirist  deliver  the  judg- 
ment of  society  on  social  conduct,  literary  taste,  and  such 
matters  as  the  law  does  not  attempt  to  cover.  That  is 
true,  but  the  prophet  and  the  satirist  would  now  both  be 
laughed  at.  Societj^  has..tak_en  the  control  of  the  matters 
that  formerly  interested  satirists  into  its  own  hands.  It 
TasTecome  a  democracy  where  every  man  is  invited  to 
contribute  what  he  knows,  and  no  one  is  permitted  to 
rise  and  speak,  as  if  from  an  upper -story  wnndow,  to 
the  populace  below.  And  that,  I  take  it,  was  what  the 
satirist  did.  It  w'as  all  very  well  when  education  was  con- 
fined to  comparatively  few,  and  the  general  bent  was 
towards  rudeness,  but  nowadays  no  such  self  -  exaltation 
could  be  endured.  Satire  has  become  the  possession  of 
the  populace  ;  it  does  not  belong  to  a  privileged  class. 
We  shouFd  be  ,as ..impatient  of  a  pi-of  essional  satirist  as  w^e 
are  of  any  one  who  undertakes  to  give  instruction  in  eti- 
qiiette  \  and  jet  the  present  day  is  not  wholly  indiiferent 
to  jnait^^„oOep,ortoi.ent,  as  any  one  may  see  by  reading 
the  novels  of  the  last  century. 

As  we  noticed  a  few  moments  ago,  the  whole  poetical 
movement  of  the  eighteenth  century  is  generally  said  to 


28o  English  Liter aUcre. 

have  been  made  under  Pope's  influence.  But  the  exact 
truth  of  this  statement  may  well  be  doubted.  For  one 
thing,  we  find  frequent  proof  of  what  Mr.  Symonds  states 
("  Renaissance  in  Italy,"  v.  2)  :  "  It  seems  to  be  a  law  of 
intellectual  development  that  the  highest  works  of  art  can 
only  be  achieved  when  the  forces  which  produced  them 
are  already  doomed,  and  in  the  act  of  disappearance." 
Only  in  this  way,  perhaps,  can  the  artist  get  the  perspec- 
tive without  losing  the  oi'iginal  inspiration;  l)ut,  whatever 
the  reason,  we  see  this  law  confirmed  by  all  our  observation. 
Dante  expressed  all  the  majesty  of  the  Middle  Ages  just 
as  they  were  about  to  disappear  forever.  Even  in  Shak- 
spere's  lifetime,  the  Elizabethan  drama,  in  the  hands  of 
his  contemporaries,  was  beginning  to  decline,  and,  at  the 
very  moment  when  Pope  haji  routed  his  adversaries,  had 
proved  and  illustrated  the  neatness  of  his  chosen  form  and 
the  power  of  his  cool  common-sense  in  the  discussion  of 
many  baflling  questions,  the  rule  of  his  formal  verse  began 
to  be  doubted,  and  new  voices  were  heai'd  "discussing 
strange  problems.*  Cowjier,  to  be  sure,  said  that  Pope 
"  made  poetry  a  mere  mechanic  art, 
And  every  warbler  had  his  tune  by  heart," 

but  this  statement  shows  the  exaggeration  of  first  at- 
tempts at  organized  revolt,  and  fails  to  do  sufficient 
justice  to  some  of  the  contemporary  resistance  to  his 
influence.     Swift,  for  instance,  represented  a  very  differ- 

*  Allan  Ramsay,  the  painter,  and  son  of  the  poet,  April  29,  1778  (vide 
Boswell's  "  Johnson  "),  said :  "  I  am  old  enough  to  have  been  a  con- 
tempoi'ary  of  Pope.  His  poetry  was  highly  admired  in  his  lifetime,  more, 
a  great  deal,  than  after  his  death."  Johnson  :  "  Sir,  it  has  not  been  less 
admired  since  his  death ;  no  authors  ever  had  so  much  faith  in  their  own 
lifetime  as  Voltaire  and  Pope ;  and  Pope's  poetry  has  been  as  much 
admired  since  his  death  as  during  his  life :  it  has  only  not  been  as  much 
talked  of;  but  that  is  owing  to  its  now  being  more  distant,  and  people 
having  other  Avritings  to  talk  of." 


English  Literature.  281 

ent  form  of  art.  Gay's  view  of  life  was  very  unlike  that 
of  Pope,  and  Prior,  whom  we  have  already  caught  trying 
to  imitate  Spenser,  wrote  little  poems  for  which  he  was 
much  more  indebted  to  French  poetry  than  to  English. 
A  fuller  study  of  the  growth  of  other  forms,  even  in 
Pope's  time,  we  must  delay  until  we  turn  to  the  study 
of  the  poetical  outbreak  towards  the  end  of  the  century, 
when  we  shall  have  occasion  to  notice  various  indications 
that  many  writers  were  seeking  greater  freedom  than  rea- 
son and  formality  could  give  them.  Now,  laying  aside  the 
poetry  for  a  while,  let  us  observe  what  was  done  in  prose 
at  this  time. 


282  English  Literature. 


CHAPTER  YII. 

The  most  striking  and  important  appearance  in  the 
English  literature  of  this  period  is  that  of  the  novel.     Let 
us  see  how  this  came  into  existence  and  how  it  flourished. 
To  do  this  it  will  not  be  necessary  to  refer  to  the  stories 
of  the  later  Greek  writers,  to  discuss  Apuleius's  "  Golden 
Ass,"  or  Lucian's  novelettes,  still  less  to  make  extracts  from 
the  recently  discovered  Egyptian  novels,  or  to  begin  an 
argument  as  to  whether  the  books  of  Job  and  Ruth  are  or 
are  not  ancient  Hebrew  novels — all  of  these  questions  have 
their  value,  but  they  need  not  trouble  us  now.     We  may 
take  it  for  granted  that  the  telling  of  stories  is  one  of  the 
fundamental  attributes  of  the  human  race.     In  the  Middle 
Ages,  our  ancestors  had  a  number  of  stories,  chiefly  in 
poetical  form,  for  their  delectation.    Such  were,  first,  those 
treating  religious  subjects,  as  versions  of  the  Old  and  Xew 
Testaments,  lives  of  saints  and  martyrs,  and  the  accounts 
of  pious  men   and  women — c.  r/.,  "The  Journey  of  St. 
Brandanus  to  the  Earthly  Paradise"  {dr.  1121),  the  "Life 
of  the  Blessed  Virgin,"  the  "  Life  of  Thomas  a  Becket "  (by 
Garnier,  cir.  1182),  the  "Story  of  the  Seven  Sleepers,"  the 
"  Life  of  St.  Elizabeth,"  etc.     Secondly,  Norman  and  Bre- 
ton mythical  and  historical  tales,  such  as  "Le  Roman  du 
Rou,"  "  Robert  le  Diable,"  "  Richart  sans  Paour,"  of  Nor- 
man origin  ;  of  Breton  origin,  the  stories  about  Brutus,  the 
Trojan,  the  Knights  of  the  Holy  Grail  —  about  Merlin, 
Lancelot,  Perceval,  etc.     Thirdly,  the  Prankish  romances. 


English  Literature.  283 

about  Charles  the  Great,  "  Le  Roman  d' Alexandre  "  {cir. 
1150),  a  paraphrase  of  Curtiiis,  with  flattering  references 
to  Louis  VII.  and  Philip  Augustus;  the  "  Roman  de  Troie," 
"Le  Livre  du  Preux  et  Vaillant  Jason,"  the  "  Contes"  and 
"  Fabliaux,"  short  stories,  the  prose  conte  being  distin- 
guished from  the  rhymed  fahliau  by  its  greater  length. 
Their  subjects  were  countless  and  varied,  and  are  especially 
to  be  noticed  for  this — that  while  the  romances  were  in  a 
great  measure,  though  not  exclusively,  the  possession  of 
the  higher  classes,  the  /abllaux  were  the  exclusive  prop- 
erty of  the  populace.  No  precise  description  can  be  given 
that  shall  apply  to  all.  It  is  well  to  notice  that  they  re- 
ferred to  the  incidents  of  every-day  life,  which  were  nar- 
rated in  a  comic  way.  In  them  we  find  the  originals  of 
some  of  Chaucer's  least  poetical  tales,  and  of  some  of  the 
stories  that  are  still  handed  down  from  one  age  to  an- 
other by  word  of  mouth  ;  *  they  turned  to  ridicule  all  pre- 

*  The  wanderings  of  stories  form  an  interesting  part  of  literary  history. 
The  fact  is,  that  there  is  nothing  rarer  than  originality,  and  a  good  novel 
in  one  language  is  sure  to  be  translated  into  every  other.  A  curious  in- 
stance of  the  wide  use  of  a  single  plot  may  be  seen  in  the  travels  of  the 
story  of  the  "Widow  of  Ephesus."  It  gets  its  name  from  the  narrative  as 
it  appears  in  Petronius ;  but  it  is  also  a  Chinese  tale,  as  well  as  Persian 
and  Arabian  and  Turkish.  Its  earliest  appearance  in  India  was  in  the 
Puntchatantra,  and  it  probably  was  carried  to  neighboring  countries  by 
the  Bud-dhists.  It  entered  Europe  in  the  collection,  the  "Seven  Sages," 
and  speedily  found  its  way  into  many  fabliaux.  The  old  story  was  told  by 
Eustace  Deschamps  (in  the  fourteenth  century),  Brantoaie  (1527-1614), 
dramatized  by  Pierre  Brinon  (1614),  and  was  told  over  again  half  a  cent- 
ury later  by  La  Fontaine,  in  one  of  his  contes.  St.  Evremond  (1678)  has  a 
translation  of  the  same  story  in  Petronius  ;  in  1682  it  was  again  dramatized ; 
1702,  by  La  Motte;  1714,  a  comic  opera;  Voltaire,  in  "Zadig"  (1747); 
Retif  de  la  Bretonne  (1734-1806),  in  one  of  his  "  Contemporaiues ;" 
Alfred  de  Musset,  in  "La  Coupe  et  les  Levres"  (1832). 

It  appeared  in  Italy  and  Spain  with  the  "Seven  Sages."  It  early  made 
its  appearance  in  England  and  Scotland  in  metrical  romances  of  the  thir- 


284  English  Literature. 

tensions  to  greatness  and  excessive  uprightness ;  they 
were  the  streak  of  realism  that  always  exists  in  the  hu- 
man race,  and  most  strongly  when  contrasted  with  artifi- 
cial pomjD.  Many  of  the  stories  thus  told  probably  de- 
scribed actual  incidents,  or  some  that,  j^erhaps,  had  been 
handed  down  by  tradition  from  very  remote  times  ;  oth- 
ers may  be  traced  to  the  "  Gesta  Romanorum  "  and  other 
collections  of  stories  made  up  from  the  Greeks  and  from 
Eastern  nations  :  the  Crusades  helped  to  introduce  these. 
"  Reynard  the  Fox  "  is  very  possibly  a  combination  into  a 
coherent  whole  of  a  number  of  stories,  the  origin  of  which 
is  like  that  of  "  Bre'r  Fox  "  and  "  Bre'r  Rabbit "  in  the 
Southern  States,  and  like  the  many  similar  stories  told  in 
various  remote  and  separate  regions.  Later  in  the  Middle 
Ages,  we  come  across  the  allegorical  stories,  of  which  the 
"  Roman  de  la  Rose  "  is  the  best  known.*     Of  course  this 

teenth,  fourteenth,  and  fifteenth  centuries  ;  in  a  separate  volume  in  1665  ; 
in  Jeremy  Taylor's  "Holy  Dying"  (1651);  Chapman  dramatized  it  in  his 
comedy,  "  The  Widow's  Tears,"  early  in  the  seventeenth  century ;  J.  Ogil- 
by  (died  1676)  wrote  a  poem  narrating  the  story;  Charles  Johnson,  a 
farce  (17S0);  Goldsmith,  in  his  "Citizen  of  the  World"  (published  in 
1762). 

In  Germany,  we  find  it  inter  alios  in  Gellert,  Wieland,  Musiius,  and 
Chamisso;  Lessing  began  a  play  with  this  plot  {vide  Griscbach,  " Die 
treulose  Wittwe,"  Stuttgart,  1877). 

Voltaire  knew  that  the  Chinese  were  familiar  with  this  story ;  vide  his 
"Sottisier"  (Paris,  1881),  p.  22.  A  French  translation  of  the  Chinese  ver- 
sion had  been  published  by  a  Jesuit  priest  in  1736. 

*  An  interesting  chapter  of  literary  history  would  be  a  full  discussion 
of  allegories  in  literature  during  and  since  the  Middle  Ages.  In  the  "Ro- 
man de  la  Rose"  allegorical  personages  abound,  drawn  as  crudely  as  the 
figures  in  ancient  illustrations  who  are  labelled  on  the  placard  issuing 
from  their  mouths.  In  the  mysteries,  too,  we  come  across  them.  This 
proved  to  be  a  long-lived  literary  form.  In  the  heroic  romances  of  Mile. 
de  Scudcry,  for  instance,  we  find  instances  of  its  survival,  as  in  the  "Carte 
du  Tcndre,"  which  was  once  famous  for  its  ingenious  representation  of 


English  Literature.  285 

is  a  very  crude  and  incomplete  description  of  mediaeval  lit- 
erature. I  can  show  now  merely  the  abundance  of  mate- 
rial, the  general  lines  in  which  it  ran,  in  the  course  of  the 
fifteenth  century,  when  prose  began  to  be  written  more 
freely.  In  this  new  guise  the  old  romances  had  even 
greater  popularity.  These  versions  appeared  in  Germany, 
England,  and  France,  and  the  latest  of  the  tales  of  chival- 
ry was  the  "  Amadis  de  Gaule,"  of  which  I  have  already 
spoken.  This  book,  which  may  be  read  in  Southey's 
modern  English  version,  differs  from  the  others  in  that  it 
and  its  many  successors  continued  popular  even  w^hen 
chivalry  had  already  faded  away.  They  are  not  so  much 
inspired  by  knighthood  after  the  manner  of  the  people's 
poetry  (  Volkspoesie)  ;  they  describe  it  with  artistic  enthu- 
siasm. These  novels  were  admired  in  Germany,  France, 
and  Spain  until  "Don  Quixote"  (1605-15)  gave  them 
their  death-blow.  Thus  we  read  in  Burton's  "Anatomy 
of  Melancholy"  (1621)  :  "If  they  read  a  booke  at  any 
time,  'tis  an  English  chronicle,  '  Sir  Iluon  of  Bordeaux,'  or 
'Amadis  de  Gaule,'  a  playe- booke,  or  some  pamplett  of 
newes  ;"  and  elsewhere  he  speaks  of  "  such  inamoratos  as 
read  nothing  but  play-books,  idle  poems,  jests, '  Amadis  de 

the  tender  passion.  This  notion  was  not  original  with  her.  Livet,  in  his 
"  Precieux  et  Precieuses,"  p.  173,  says  that  Charles  Sorel,  author  of  "  Fran- 
cion,"  in  another  book  had  described  something  of  the  kind,  as  had  an- 
other writer.  All  this  belongs  rather  to  French  literature,  but  it  has  a 
meaning  for  us  when  we  recall  the  corresponding  treatment  of  his  story 
by  Bunyan,  in  his  "  Pilgrim's  Progress."  What  the  French  writers  had 
done  profanely,  he  did  in  behalf  of  religion,  so  that  this  wonderful  book  is 
one  of  the  last  expressions  of  medisevalism  in  English  literature.  In  art 
tliere  correspond  with  it  the  quaint  decorations  of  cathedrals,  and  some  of 
the  old  illustrations  of  JISS. — e.  g.,  P.  Lacroix,  "  Vie  Religieuse  et  Militaire 
au  Moyen  Age,"  etc.,  p.  448,  tiie  reproduction  of  an  old  picture  in  a  missal 
of  the  "  Fortress  of  Faith,"  besieged  by  heretics  and  the  impious,  and  de- 
fended by  the  Pope,  etc. 


286  English  Literature. 

Gaul,'  the  '  Knight  of  the  Sun,'  the  '  Seven  Champions,' 
'Palmerin  de  Oliva,'  'Huon    of   Bourdeaux,'  etc.     Such 
many  times  prove  in  the  end  as  mad  as  'Don  Quixote.'  " 
"Don  Quixote"  had  been  put  into  English  by  Thomas 
Shelton  (1612-20).     The  original  Amadis  was  a  genuine 
expression  of  chivalry  just  as  it  was  about  to  disappear, 
and  it  was  really  of  enormous  influence  on  later  literature. 
It  not  only  inspired  numerous  successors,  it  affected  the 
style  of  historians,  just  as  Sir  Walter  Scott's  novels  al- 
tered the  whole  method  of  historical  writing,  made  bulky 
volumes  fascinating,  and  history  picturesque.     In  Italy, 
however,  these  tales  of  chivalry  lost  their  hold  on  the  peo- 
ple.    Dante,  Petrarch,  Boccaccio,  and  Ariosto  all  show  in- 
timacy with  them,  but  the  literary  tendency  ran  in  the 
direction   of   the  brief,  concise  tale,  in  a  few  words,  of 
some  adventure.    For  one  thing,  the  classics  expelled  these 
impossible  romances,  and  the  inclination  of  the  Italians 
towards  the  peaceful  arts  and  commerce  made  them  in- 
tolerant of  the  vast  impossibilities  which  seemed  entranc- 
ing to  less  polished  nations.     Even  Ariosto  and  Pulci, 
when  they  chose  the  romances  for  their  subject,  wrote 
about  them  in  a  mocking  spirit  ;    and  Boiardo  civilized 
them,  so^ to  speak,  when  he  wrote  his  "Orlando."     But 
they  disappeared  from  literature  before  the  novella,  the 
most  characteristic  form   of    Italian   literature.      It  was 
built  up  on  the  French  fabliaux,  and  on  the  short  stories 
that   reached   Europe   from  the   East,  in   the   "  Hitopa- 
desa."     This  work,  Dunlop  states  {vide  his  "History  of 
Fiction,"  i.  382),  was  preserved  by  an  Indian  king  as  one 
of  his  greatest  treasures.      In  time   a  Persian  king  (at 
the  end  of  the  sixth  century)    sent  a  learned  physician 
into  India  to  get  a  copy  of  this  famous  book.     This  phy- 
sician accomplished  his  object  by  inducing  an  alleged  sage 
to  steal  the  book,  the  bribe  he  employed  being  "a  prom- 


English  Literature.  iZ"] 

ise  of  intoxication."  The  physician  translated  the  book 
into  Persian,  thence  into  Syriac  and  Arabic;  about  1100 
it  was  translated  from  Arabic  into  Greek,  in  the  thir- 
teenth century  from  Greek  into  Latin,  thence  into  Ger- 
man, Spanish,  and  Italian,  and  from  Italian  into  English 
in  1570.  This,  we  must  understand,  is  merely  one  of  the 
streams  that  supplied  the  abundant  material  of  the  Ital- 
ian novelists.  Curiously  enough,  the  novella  never  de- 
veloped into  the  modern  novel  —  that  production  seems 
to  belong  only  to  nations  which  have  had  a  drama  :  it 
is  the  modern  version  of  the  play.  Yet  these  short 
stories  of  the  Italian  novelists  supplied  the  English  dram- 
atists with  abundant  subjects.*  Shakspere's  "  Twelfth 
Night,"  "Romeo  and  Juliet,"  "Othello,"  "Measure  for 
Measure,"  "  Merchant  of  Venice,"  "  Much  Ado  about 
Nothing,"  "  Cymbeline,"  are  to  a  greater  or  less  extent 
derived  from  Italian  stories,  and  what  is  true  of  Shak- 
spere  is  true  of  many  of  his  contemporaries  and  succes- 
sors. On  the  modern  novel  these  short  stories  had  but 
little  influence. 

The  tales  of  chivalry,  especially  those  about  Amadis 
and  his  successors,  had  a  long  popularity,  and  they,  as  I 
have  said,  were  only  finally  crushed  by  "  Don  Quixote," 
in  which  we  find  that  the  parody  keeps  close  to  the  text 
of  the  "Amadis."  Yet  Cervantes  did  not  begin  this  at- 
tack on  the  crumbling  tales  of  chivalry.  The  picaresque 
novels,  as  they  are  called,  had  already  made  their  apjiear- 
ance,  and  these  it  may  be  well  to  describe  at  some  length, 

*  Boccaccio  was  translated  in  full  in  1620,  but  many  of  his  stories — 
Bandello's  and  Cinthio's  —  had  been  translated  in  William  Paynter's 
"Palace  of  Pleasure"  (1566).  The  first  volume  contains  sixty  novels, 
and  the  second  thirty- four.  The  stories,  however,  came  through  the 
French,  being  taken  from  Belleforest's  French  version,  as  T.  North's 
"  Plutarch  "  was  taken  from  Amvot's  translation. 


288  English  Literature. 

because  they  undoubtedly  bad  vast  influence  on  the  Eng- 
lish novel ;  and  they  acquired  this,  it  is  well  to  notice, 
by  not  being  simply  destructive,  but  by  being  construc- 
tive, by  bringing  forward  new  ideals  and  new  subjects. 
No  one  of  the  picaresque  novels  approaches  the  greatness 
of  "  Don  Quixote,"  which  is  really  inimitable,  and  is  now 
read  for  itself  without  care  for  what  it  says  about  chival- 
ry. It  was  what  was  latent  in  the  early  novels  that  has 
been  developed  by  subsequent  writers.  No  complicated 
form  of  literature  steps  forth  at  once  in  a  condition  of 
completeness  ;  the  drama  makes  its  way  to  excellence  only 
by  successive  changes,  and  the  novel  advances  only  gradu- 
ally. Of  course  this  is  the  only  way  in  which  works  of  art 
attain  excellence;  and  in  the  picaresque  stories  we  catch  the 
modern  novel,  so  to  speak,  in  the  bud,  and  we  shall  be  able 
to  trace  its  modifications  down  to  the  most  recent  times. 

That  the  tales  of  chivalry  were  fascinating,  that  they 
encouraged  the  imitation  of  some  of  the  deeds  and  many 
of  the  emotions  that  inspired  chivalry,  is  not  only  in  it- 
self probable,  but  it  is  confirmed  by  outside  evidence.  The 
novel  and  society,  for  that  matter,  play,  as  it  Avere,  into 
each  other's  hands.  The  novel  pictures  society,  and  so- 
ciety sees  itself  mirrored  in  the  novel,  and  takes  its  image 
for  a  model  or  a  warning.  Hence  the  power  of  a  novel 
as  a  moral  teacher.  Indeed,  literature  is  a  phonographic 
sheet  on  which  are  expressed  the  tlioughts  and  emotions 
of  all  ages,  and  in  the  novel  we  catch  society  as  it  really 
was  and  is,  rather  than  as  it  was  when  it  was  especially 
end.eavoring  to  be  magniloquent.  Nowadays  we  continu- 
ally find  in  the  news})apers  that  two  boys,  aged  eleven  and 
thirteen,  were  found  in  the  train  going  to  New  York,  each 
armed  with  a  shot-gun  and  a  bowie-knife,  and  provided 
with  his  father's  pocket-book,  their  intention  being  to 
shoot  buffaloes  and  fight  Indians,  and  that  they  were  in- 


English  Literature.  289 

spired  thereto  by  reading  dime-novels.  In  the  same  way, 
Cortez  and  Pizarro,*  when  they  came  to  America,  not  only 
felt  the  genuine  greed  of  conquerors,  but  compared  them- 

*  Prescott,  "Conquest  of  Peru"  (ed.  1868),  i.  190,  and  "Conquest  of 
Mexico"  (Phila.  1874),  i.  47. 

In  1543,  Charles  the  Fifth  prohibited  the  introduction  of  books  of 
chivah-y  into  the  American  colonies,  and  forbade  their  being  printed  or 
even  read  there.  In  1555,  the  Cortes  presented  to  the  king  a  petition 
(tiiat  required  only  the  royal  signature  to  become  law),  urging  the  de- 
struction of  these  romances.  Thus  (Prescott,  "  Biographical  and  Critical 
Essays,"  pp.  143  and  634) :  "  Moreover,  we  say  that  it  is  very  notorious 
what  mischief  has  been  done  to  young  men  and  maidens,  and  other  per- 
sons, by  the  perusal  of  books  full  of  lies  and  vanities,  like  Amadis  and 
works  of  that  description,  since  young  people  especially,  from  their  natural 
idleness,  resort  to  this  kind  of  reading,  and  becoming  enamoured  of  pas- 
sages of  love  or  arms,  or  other  nonsense  which  they  find  set  forth  therein, 
when  situations  at  all  analogous  offer,  are  led  to  act  much  more  extrava- 
gantly than  they  would  otherwise  have  done.  And  many  times  the  daughter, 
when  her  mother  has  locked  her  up  safely  at  home,  amuses  herself  with 
reading  these  books,  which  do  her  more  hurt  than  she  would  have  re- 
ceived from  going  abroad.  All  which  redounds  not  only  to  the  dishonour 
of  individuals,  but  to  the  great  detriment  of  conscience,  by  diverting  the 
affections  from  holy,  true  and  Christian  doctrine,  to  those  wicked  vanities 
with  which  the  wits,  as  we  have  intimated,  are  completely  bewildered.  To 
remedy  this,  we  entreat  your  Majesty  that  no  book  treating  of  such  matters 
be  henceforth  permitted  to  be  read,  that  those  now  printed  be  collected 
and  burned,  and  that  none  be  published  hereafter  without  special  license ; 
by  which  measures  your  Majesty  will  render  great  service  to  God  as  well 
as  to  your  kingdoms,"  etc. 

Cf.  "  Eastward  Ho  "  ( by  Chapman,  B.  Jonson,  and  Marston ),  iii.  2 
(1605),  "I  tell  thee,  gold  is  more  plentiful  there  than  copper  is  with  us." 
..."  Why,  man,  all  their  dripping-pans  .  .  .  are  pure  gold ;  and  all  the 
chains  with  which  they  chain  up  their  streets  are  massy  gold  ;  all  the 
prisoners  they  take  are  fettered  in  gold ;  and  for  rubies  and  diamonds, 
they  go  forth  on  holidays  and  gather  them  by  the  sea-shore,  to  hang  on 
their  children's  coats  and  stick  in  their  caps,  as  commonly  as  our  children 
wear  saffron-gilt  brooches  and  groats  with  hoals  in  them." 

And  Sidney,  "  Defense  of  Poesy ;"  "  Truly  I  have  known  men,  that  even 

13 


290  English  Literature. 

selves  with  the  dragon-slayers  whose  deeds  had  fired  their 
imagination  from  boyhood.  We  know,  for  instance,  that 
the  Mississippi  was  discovered  by  De  Soto  when  he  was 
searching  for  the  fountain  of  youth — the  Eldorado,  as  it 
was  called,  seemed  to  fulfil  every  promise  ;  and  we  may  be 
sure  that  the  conquest  of  Mexico  or  Peru  would  not  have 
formed  the  romantic  story  that  it  did  if  its  conquerors  had 
not  been  fed  on  romance.  We  denounce  them  for  their 
cruelty  to  their  enemies,  but  the  tales  they  had  read  were 
full  of  the  slaughter  of  heretics.  They,  like  the  rest  of 
the  world,  breathed  the  air  of  their  time.  Or,  if  we  de- 
sire further  proof,  it  may  be  found  without  difficulty.  In 
one  of  the  early  novels,  in  the  picaresque  style,  published 
in  France  ("  Histoire  Comique  de  Francion,"  ed.  Delahays, 
1858,  p.  128)  :  "It  became  my  pastime  to  read  nothing 
but  books  of  chivalry,  and  I  must  tell  you  that  this  occu- 
pation sharpened  my  courage  and  gave  me  unparalleled 
desires  to  seek  adventures  in  the  wide  world.  For  it 
seemed  to  me  that  it  would  be  as  easy  with  one  blow  to 
cut  a  man  in  two,  as  it  would  be  to  cut  an  apple.  I  Avas 
full  of  sovereign  content  when  I  saw  a  horrible  massacre 
of  giants  cut  into  mincemeat.  The  blood  which  flowed 
from  their  wounds  formed  a  stream  of  rose-water  in  which 
I  bathed  most  deliciously  ;  and  sometimes  I  imagined  that 
I  was  the  youth  who  kissed  the  maiden  with  green  eyes 
like  a  falcon.  I  use  the  language  of  those  true  chronicles. 
In  a  word,  my  mind  was  full  of  nothing  but  castles,  or- 
chards, combats,  enchantments,  delights,  and  love-making, 
and  when  I  remembered  that  this  was  all  nothing  but  fic- 
tion, I  said  that  it  was  wrong  to  blame  reading  of  this 

witli  reading  Araadis  de  Gaul,  which  God  knoweth,  wantcth  much  of  a 
perfect  Poesy,  have  found  their  hearts  moved  to  the  exercise  of  courtesy, 
liberality  and  especially  courage." 


English  Literature.  291 

kind,  and  that  henceforth  it  was  but  to  lead  the  sort  of 
life  most  akin  to  that  described  in  these  books ;  thereupon 
I  began  to  blame  the  vile  conditions  of  the  men  of  this 
century,  whom  I  have  to-day  in  great  honor."  Then  he  de- 
scribes at  great  length  his  reaction  from  the  restraints  of  the 
bourgeois  society  which  was  beginning  to  acquire  power. 
Let  us  now  see  what  the  picaresque*  novel  was,  and 
perhaps  we  shall  be  able  to  make  out  how  it  came  into 
existence.  The  first  one,  the  "  Lazarillo  de  Tormes,"  was 
written  by  Mendoza,  in  his  twenty -first  year,  w^hen  he 
was  a  student  at  the  University  of  Salamanca,  but  first 
published  only  in  1553  (being  delayed  possibly  from 
fear  of  the  Inquisition).  Mendoza,  who  was  born  early 
in  the  sixteenth  century  (1503-75),  was  one  of  the  dis- 
tinguished men  of  his  time,  as  a  diplomatist  and  a  his- 
torian. With  those  sides  of  his  character,  however,  we 
have  nothing  to  do.  We  shall  examine  only  his  work 
as  a  novelist.  The  hero,  who  tells  the  story  in  the 
first  person,  and  whose  name  is  that  of  the  book,  is  the 
son  of  a  miller  who  lived  on  the  banks  of  the  Torrae^. 
His  father  dies  early,  and  the  boy,  when  eight  years  old, 
makes  his  first  start  in  life.  "About  this  time,  a  blind 
man  came  to  lodge  at  the  house,  and  thinking  that  I 
should  do  very  well  to  lead  him  about,  asked  my  mother 
to  part  with  me  for  that  purpose.  My  mother  recom- 
mended me  strongly,  stating  that  I  was  the  son  of  an  ex- 
cellent man  who  died  in  battle  against  the  enemies  of  our 
faith."  (He  had  been  found  guilty  of  stealing  grain  from 
his  customers ;  he  had  "joined  an  armament  then  preparing 

*  Picaro  is  a  rogue.  The  word  is  well  defined  in  an  interesting  article 
in  the  Cornhill  for  June,  1875,  p.  671  :  "The  picaro  is  not  necessarily  a 
thief,  or  a  cheat,  or  an  impostor,  but  one  who  has  no  scruple  about  lying, 
cheating,  or  stealing,  under  the  slightest  possible  circumstances."  The 
distinction  is  most  subtle. 


292  English  Literature. 

against  the  Moors,  in  the  quality  of  mule-driver  to  a  gen- 
tleman ;  and  in  that  expedition,  like  a  loyal  servant,  he, 
along  with  his  master,  finished  his  life  and  services  to- 
gether." His  father,  "  being  convicted  of  bleeding  his  cus- 
tomers' sacks,  suffered  with  such  exemplary  patience  the 
reward  appointed  by  the  law  in  cases  of  that  nature,  that 
his  friends  have  ground  to  hope  he  is  among  the  number 
of  the  saints"  [ed.  19,  1777]  :  the  reward  consisted  in  his 
"  being  whipt  through  the  whole  town,  and  the  city  arms 
imprinted  on  his  shoulders,")  "  She  confided  me  to  his  care 
as  an  orphan  boy,  and  entreated  him  to  use  me  with  kind- 
ness. The  old  man  promised  to  receive  me,  not  as  a  ser- 
vant, but  as  a  son;  and  thus  I  commenced  service  with  my 
new  though  blind  and  aged  master."  The  way  in  which  the 
blind  man  fulfilled  his  promise  was  as  follows :  "  We  left 
Salamanca,  and  having  arrived  at  the  bridge,  my  master 
directed  my  attention  to  an  animal  carved  in  stone  in  the 
form  of  a  bull,  and  desired  me  to  take  him  near  it.  When 
I  had  placed  him  close  to  it,  he  said, '  Lazaro,  if  you  put 
your  ear  close  to  this  bull,  you  will  hear  an  extraordinary 
noise  within.'  In  the  simplicity  of  my  heart,  believing  it 
to  be  as  he  said,  I  put  my  ear  to  the  stone,  when  the  old 
man  gave  my  head  such  a  violent  thump  against  it,  that  I 
was  almost  bereft  of  sense,  and  for  three  days  after  I  did 
not  lose  the  pain  I  suffered  from  the  blow."  This  expe- 
rience opened  his  eyes  to  the  ways  of  the  world  he  was 
entering.  Moreover,  his  blind  master  nearly  starved  him. 
He  used  to  carry  his  food  in  a  linen  knapsack,  and  give 
the  boy  a  few  scraps,  and  then  close  the  bag  ;  the  boy 
made  a  small  rip  in  the  seam  of  the  bag  and  would  take 
out  choice  pieces  of  meat,  bacon,  and  sausage,  and  then 
close  the  seam.  Moreover, "  all  that  I  could  collect,  either 
by  fraud  or  otherwise,  I  carried  about  me  in  half -far- 
things ;  so  tliat  when  the  old  man  was  sent  for  to  pray, 


English  Literature.  293 

and  they  gave  him  farthings  (all  of  which  passed  through 
ray  hands,  he  being  blind),  I  contrived  to  slip  them  into 
my  mouth,  by  which  process  so  quick  an  alteration  was 
effected,  that  when  they  reached  his  hands  they  were  in- 
variably reduced  to  half  their  original  value.  The  cun- 
ning old  fellow,  however,  suspected  me,  for  he  used  to  say, 
'  How  the  deuce  is  this  ?  ever  since  you  have  been  with 
me  they  give  me  nothing  but  half -farthings  ;  whereas  be- 
fore, it  was  not  an  unusual  thing  to  be  paid  with  half- 
pence, but  never  less  than  farthings.  I  must  be  sharp 
with  you,  I  find.' "  The  old  man  was  unusually  careful  of 
his  jar  of  wine,  and  the  boy  was  forever  trying  to  outwit 
him,  and  get  a  chance  to  drink  of  it.  Soon  he  was  de- 
tected and  the  old  man  used  to  fasten  it  to  himself  hj  a 
string  attached  to  the  handle.  Consequently,  the  young 
rogue  got  a  large  straw  and  drew  the  wine  through  it. 
After  that,  the  blind  man  kept  it  between  his  knees,  and 
held  his  hand  over  the  mouth.  The  boy  consequently 
bored  a  little  hole  into  the  bottom,  which  he  closed  very 
delicately  with  wax.  "At  dinner  time,  when  the  poor 
old  man  sat  over  the  fire,  with  the  jar  between  his  knees, 
the  heat,  slight  as  it  was,  melted  the  little  piece  of  wax, 
and  I,  feigning  to  be  cold,  drew  close  to  the  fire,  and 
placed  my  mouth  under  the  little  fountain  in  such  a  mali- 
ner  that  the  whole  contents  of  the  jar  became  my  share. 
When  the  old  man  had  finished  his  meal,  and  thought  to 
regale  himself  with  his  draught  of  wine,  the  deuce  a  drop 
did  lie  find,  which  so  enraged  and  surprised  him,  that  he 
thought  the  devil  himself  had  been  at  work  ;  nor  could 
he  conceive  how  it  could  be.  '  Now,  uncle,'  said  I, '  don't 
say  that  I  drank  your  wine,  seeing  that  you  have  had 
your  hand  on  it  the  whole  time.' "  But  the  old  man  felt 
all  over  the  jar,  and  found  out  the  trick  that  had  been 
played  on  him,  but  said  nothing.     The  next  time  the  boy 


294  English  Literature. 

was  stealing  the  wine,  the  blind  man  raised  the  jar  and 
broke  it  over  the  boy's  face,  bruising  him  severely,  and 
afterwards  the  old  man  was  perpetually  maltreating  the 
boy.  When  bystanders  would  remonstrate,  he  would  nar- 
rate the  boy's  rogueries  so  that  those  who  listened  would 
say,  "  Thrash  him  well,  good  man ;  thrash  him  well ;  he 
deserves  it  richly  !"  The  boy's  revenge  consisted  in  lead- 
ing the  blind  man  over  the  worst  roads,  over  the  sharpest 
stones,  and  through  the  deepest  mud.  "  It  is  true  that  my 
head  and  shoulders  were  subjected  in  consequence  to  the 
angry  visitations  of  his  staff  ;  and  though  I  continually 
assured  him  that  his  uneasy  travelling  was  not  the  result 
of  my  ill-will,  but  for  the  want  of  better  roads,  yet  the 
old  traitor  had  too  much  cunning  to  believe  a  word  I 
said."  Among  his  other  tricks,  when  his  master  was  once 
cooking  a  sausage,  this  bOy  stole  the  sausage  and  substi- 
tuted a  turnip,  for  which  he  was  again  beaten.  The  next 
day  was  wet,  and  as  he  led  the  blind  man  on  his  round  of 
begging,  the  boy  devised  this  ingenious  plan,  which  he 
thus  narrates  :  "  On  our  return  we  had  to  pass  a  small 
stream  of  water,  which  with  the  day's  rain  had  grown 
quite  large.  I  therefore  said, '  Uncle,  the  brook  is  very 
much  swollen  ;  but  I  see  a  place  a  little  higher,  where  by 
jmn})ing  a  little  we  may  pass  almost  dry-shod.'  '  Thou 
art  a  good  lad,'  said  the  old  man  ;  '  I  like  you  for  your 
carefulness.  Take  me  to  the  narrowest  part,  for  at  this 
time  of  year,  it  would  be  dangerous  to  get  our  feet  wet.' 
Delighted  that  my  plot  seemed  to  succeed  so  well,  I  led 
him  from  beneath  the  arcades,  and  led  him  to  directly 
opposite  to  a  pillar,  or,  rather,  to  a  large  stone  post,  which 
I  observed  in  the  square.  'Now,  uncle,'  said  I,  'this  is  the 
place  where  the  brook  is  narrowest.'  The  rain  was  pour- 
ing down,  and  the  man  was  getting  very  wet ;  and  whether 
it  was  by  his  haste  to  avoid  it,  or,  as  is  more  probable. 


English  Literature.  295 

Providence  at  that  moment  deprived  him  of  his  usual 
cunning,  that  he  might  fall  into  my  snare,  and  give  me 
my  revenge,  he  believed  me  and  said, '  Now  place  me  op- 
posite the  spot,  and  do  you  jump  yourself.'  I  placed  him 
directly  opposite  the  pillar  so  that  he  could  not  miss  it, 
and  leaping  over  myself,  I  placed  myself  just  behind  the 
jiost,  whence  I  shouted,  '  Now,  master,  jump  as  hard  as 
you  can,  and  you  will  clear  the  water.'  The  words  wei'e 
hardly  out  of  my  mouth  when  the  poor  old  rogue  started 
up  as  nimbly  as  a  goat,  took  a  step  or  two  backwards  to 
get  an  impetus,  which  lent  his  leap  such  force,  that  in- 
stead of  alighting  on  soft  ground,  as  he  supposed  he 
should  do,  he  gave  his  poor  bald  pate  such  a  smash 
against  the  pillar  that  he  fell  to  the  ground  without  sense 
or  motion.  '  Take  that,  you  unhappy  old  thief,'  said  I, '  and 
remember  the  sausage  ;'  then  leaving  him  to  the  care  of 
the  people  who  began  to  gather,  I  took  to  my  heels  as 
swiftly  as  possible  through  the  town  gates,  and  before 
night  reached  Torrejos.  What  became  of  the  old  man 
afterwards  I  don't  know,  and  neither  did  I  ever  give  my- 
self any  pains  to  find  out." 

After  thus  getting  rid  of  one  master,  the  boy  ran  until 
he  got  to  a  place  called  Maqueda,  where  he  fell  in  Avith  a 
priest,  into  whose  sei'vice  he  entered.  But  "  the  old  blind 
man,  selfish  as  he  was,  seemed  an  Alexander  the  Great,  in 
point  of  munificence,  in  comparison  with  this  priest,  who 
was,  without  exception,  the  most  niggardly  of  all  miser- 
able devils  I  have  ever  met  with.  It  seemed  as  if  the 
meanness  of  the  whole  world  were  gathered  together  in 
his  wretched  person.  It  would  be  hard  to  say  whether  he 
inherited  this  disposition,  or  whether  he  had  adopted  it 
with  his  cassock  and  gown."  (This  last  sentence  was 
stricken  out  by  the  Inquisition.)  Here  the  boy  went 
through  another  course  of  starvation,  smelling  the  string 


296  English  Literature. 

of  onions  in  the  garret  and  sucking  the  dry  bones  on 
which  the  priest  had  meagrely  dined.  At  mass,  the  priest 
watched  every  coin  that  fell  into  the  plate.  The  bread 
and  wine  left  from  the  church  he  would  lock  up  in  a  chest, 
saying,  "'You  see,  my  boy,  that  priests  ought  to  be  very 
abstemious  in  their  food.  For  my  part,  I  do  think  it  a 
great  scandal  to  indulge  in  food  and  wine  as  many  do.' 
But  the  curmudgeon  lied  most  grossly,  for  at  convents  and 
funerals,  when  we  went  to  pray,  he  would  eat  like  a  wolf, 
and  drink  like  a  mountebank  ;  and  now  I  speak  of  funer- 
als— God  forgive  me,  I  was  never  an  enemy  to  the  human 
race  but  at  that  unhappy  period  of  my  life,  and  the  reason 
was  solely,  that  on  these  occasions  I  obtained  a  meal  of 
victuals.  Every  day  I  did  hope  and  pray  that  God  would 
be  pleased  to  take  his  own.  Whenever  we  w^ere  sent  for 
to  administer  to  the  sick,  the  priest  would  of  course  desire 
all  present  to  join  in  prayer.  You  may  be  certain  I  was 
not  the  last  in  these  devout  exercises,  and  I  prayed  with 
all  my  heart  that  the  Lord  would  take  pity  on  the  afflicted, 
not  by  restoring  him  to  the  vanities  of  life,  but  by  reliev- 
ing him  from  the  sins  of  this  world  ;  and  when  any  of 
these  unfortunates  recovered — the  Lord  forgive  me — in 
the  anguish  of  my  heart  I  wished  him  a  thousand  times 
in  perdition  ;  but  if  he  died  no  one  was  more  sincere  in 
his  blessings  than  myself.  During  all  the  time  that  I  was 
in  this  service,  which  was  nearly  six  months,  only  twenty 
persons  paid  the  debt  of  nature,  and  these  I  verily  believe 
that  I  killed,  or,  rather,  that  they  died  of  the  incessant 
importunity  of  my  prayers." 

Once,  however,  when  the  priest  was  away,  a  tinker,  or, 
as  he  thought,  an  angel  in  the  guise  of  a  tinker,  came 
along,  whom  the  young  rogue  told  that  he  had  lost  the 
key  of  the  chest,  and  the  man  fitted  one  for  him,  so  that 
he  had  access  to  the  loaves.     But,  of  course,  he  had  to 


English  Literature.  297 

help  himself  only  sparingly  after  his  first  hungry  thefts 
Avere  discovered.  Then  he  stole  some  more,  and  made 
holes  in  the  chest  as  if  rats  had  been  at  it.  When  those 
holes  were  stuffed  up  he  made  new  ones.  His  master  was 
amazed.  "  What  can  it  mean  ?"  he  asked  ;  "  as  long  as  I 
have  been  here,  there  have  never  been  rats  before."  And 
he  might  say  so  with  truth  ;  if  ever  a  house  in  the  king- 
dom deserved  to  be  free  from  rats  it  was  his,  as  they  are 
seldom  known  to  appear  when  there  is  nothing  to  eat. 
Then  the  priest  set  a  trap,  but  the  boy  stole  the  cheese 
and  ate  it  with  more  of  the  bread.  Then  some  one  sug- 
gested that  the  food  was  stolen  by  a  snake,  and  the  priest 
was  forever  jumping  up  to  find  the  snake.  Meanwhile 
the  boy  slept  with  the  key  in  his  mouth  for  the  sake  of 
safety  ;  but  one  night  his  breath  made  it  whistle,  and  the 
priest,  feeling  sure  that  now  he  had  caught  the  snake  by 
its  hissing,  came  with  a  club,  and  moaning  to  kill  it,  but 
he  hit  the  boy  on  the  head,  bruising  him  severely,  and 
finding  the  key.  As  soon  as  the  boy  had  recovered  he 
was  discharged  by  his  master,  who  said,  "  No  one  will  ever 
doubt  that  you  have  served  a  blind  man  ;  but  as  for  me, 
I  do  not  require  so  diligent  or  so  clever  a  servant."  Then 
he  betakes  himself  to  Toledo,  and  enters  the  service  of  a 
new  master,  a  grandee  of  great  splendor,  who  is  also  in- 
clined to  practise  starvation.  "  He  had  an  air  of  ease  and 
consequence  "  which  persuaded  the  boy  to  think  that  this 
was  just  the  situation  he  desired.  But  this  esquire,  though 
he  made  to  the  world  a  great  show  of  elegance,  was  really 
without  a  penny.  The  boy  then  was  thrown  on  his  wits, 
and  had  to  beg  his  food  from  door  to  door.  The  supply 
he  gathered  in  this  way  he  shared  with  his  master,  for 
whom  he  feels  very  genuine  sympathy.  Soon,  however, 
a  law  was  passed  against  vagrancy,  and  they  both  began 
to  suffer  ;  but  the  master  managed  to  get  a  little  money, 

13* 


298  Engliah  Literature. 

which  they  spent  in  food,  but  the  landlord  carae  for  his 
rent  and  the  esquire  disappeared,  leaving  the  boy  to  shift 
for  himself.  With  his  fourth  master,  a  friar,  he  stayed 
but  a  little  while  ;  and  then  he  entered  the  service  of  a 
dealer  in  Papal  indulgences,  the  description  of  whose  per- 
formances gave  the  writer  an  opportunity  to  make  some 
remarks  which  did  not  please  the  Inquisition.  This  new 
master  he  detected  in  his  impositions,  so  that  he  left  him 
in  disgust.  Then  he  entered  the  service  of  a  chaplain,  and 
made  a  little  sum  of  money  by  selling  water,  after  which 
he  became  the  servant  of  an  alguazil,  and  married  an 
ignoble  woman.  Here  the  novel  was  left  in  an  unfinished 
state,  although  its  publication  was  soon  followed  by  that 
of  a  continuation  by  another  hand,  with  more  adventures; 
one  of  which  was  that  the  hero  was  saved  from  shipwreck 
and  dressed  so  as  to  represent  a  merman,  and  was  so  ex- 
hibited in  many  towns  of  Spain.  He  finally  escaped,  and 
after  some  adventures  reached  a  hermitage.  The  original 
hermit  died  soon  after,  and  this  hero  assumed  his  dress 
and  lived  on  the  contributions  of  the  charitable  people  of 
the  neighborhood — an  incident  which  is  also  to  be  found 
in  "Gil  Bias,"  in  the  history  of  Don  Raphael  (v.  i.). 

I  describe  this  story  at  some  length,  because  it  is  the 
earliest  of  the  picaresque  novels,  and  is  remarkable  in 
many  ways.  Not  only  is  the  whole  tone  diametrically 
opposite  to  that  of  the  tales  of  chivalry,  but  the  book  is 
worthy  of  attention  for  the  way  in  which  it  breaks  a 
wholly  new  path  for  literature.  In  itself  it  is  curious,  and 
as  the  leader  of  one  of  the  great  movements  in  modern 
writing  it  is  deserving  of  great  respect.  It  had  no  prede- 
cessor, but  the  author  managed  to  see  and  to  put  down 
some  of  the  characteristics  of  the  life  about  him.  The 
Spanish  peasant  had  acquired  importance  in  the  wars  that 
had  devastated  that  country  in  the  protracted  struggle 


Engllah  Literature.  299 

against  tlie  Moors,  and  the  numberless  proverbs  in  "  Don 
Quixote"  show  how  his  character  had  been  formed,  how 
he  had  learned  wisdom  in  the  only  way  in  which  wisdom 
can  be  learned,  through  experience  ;  and  they  pi'ove  how 
unlike  his  practical  good-sense  was  to  the  fantastic  notions 
of  the  Spanish  knights,  who  were  still  under  the  delusion 
of  the  splendor  of  chivalry.  In  the  reign  of  Ferdinand 
and  Isabella,  several  knights  went  into  foreign  parts,  "  in 
order  to  try  the  fortune  of  arms  with  any  cavalier  that 
might  be  pleased  to  venture  Avith  them,  and  so  gain  honor 
for  themselves,  and  the  fame  of  valiant  and  bold  knights 
for  the  gentlemen  of  Castile."  And  Ticknor  says  :  "  Cas- 
tillo, another  chronicler,  tells  us  gravely,  in  1587,  that 
Philip  II.,  when  he  married  Mary  of  England,  only  forty 
years  earlier,  promised  that  if  King  Arthur  should  return 
to  claim  the  throne  he  would  peaceably  yield  to  that 
prince  all  his  rights  ;  thus  implying,  at  least  in  Castillo 
himself,  and  probably  in  many  of  his  readers,  a  full  faith 
in  the  stories  of  Arthur  and  his  Round  Table."  Yet 
alongside  of  these  fantastic  people  was  the  populace, 
made  up  of  shrewd  men  living  by  their  wits,  compressing 
their  wisdom  into  proverbs,  which  you  will  notice  are 
always  abundant  in  a  subjected  race  or  class.  Prosperous 
people  never  make  proverbs;  they  have  leisure,  or,  at  least, 
freedom  for  discussion  ;  but  among  the  oppressed  they 
are  current  as  convenient,  easily  remembered  condensa- 
tions of  the  lessons  of  life.  They  pass  from  mouth  to 
mouth  as  safe  expressions,  when  long  denunciations  or 
asseverations  would  be  full  of  danger.  This  quality, 
perhaps,  combines  with  their  brevity  and  picturesque- 
ness  in  making  proverbs  popular  among  the  uneducated. 
Notice  their  abundance  in  the  East,  in  Spain,  and  Russia, 
and  among  the  former  slaves  in  the  South.  The  nat- 
ure of  the  people  struck  Mendoza,  aristocrat  though  he 


300  £n<jUsh  Literature. 

was,  and  this  was  strange  enough  when  we  consider  how 
rare  it  is  for  a  writer  to  see  through  the  mists  of  the 
literary  atmosphere  of  liis  times.  Yet  when  a  man  has 
this  power,  when  living  in  an  artificial  time — and  it  is  the 
inevitable  tendency  of  all  literary  movements  to  become 
artificial,  to  substitute  mechanism  for  originality — the  re- 
action is  a  great  one,  and  in  the  most  unreal  times  we  find 
an  undercurrent  which  only  assumes  importance  in  the 
works  of  men  of  ability,  reacting  violently  against  the 
accepted  forms.  When  Pope  writes  pastorals,  and  poetry 
becomes  didactic,  Swift  paints  the  gross  side  of  reality  ; 
when  chivalry  fires  the  brains  of  half  the  world,  the  other 
half  is  telling  ribald  anecdotes  or  beginning  to  draw  pict- 
ures of  actual  life.  To  be  amazed  at  the  contrast  is  like 
being  amazed  at  the  existence  of  comedy  alongside  of 
tragedy,  or  that  shadows  are  black  when  the  sun  is  shin- 
ing bright.  It  is  only  in  a  fog  that  there  are  no  contrasts 
of  light  and  shade. 

Another  important  trait  of  these  novels  is  the  fact 
that  their  writers  went  back  to  the  people  for  their  sub- 
ject; and  even  now  we  daily  speak  of  the  people  as  if  they 
were  a  race,  valuable,  to  be  sure,  to  the  curious  student  of 
natural  history,  but  in  other  respects  remote  from  our- 
selves. Without  referring  to  the  political  bearings  of 
this  misunderstanding,  I  will  merely  say  that  literature, 
which  is  not  a  thing  apart  from  human  interests,  follows 
the  same  path  with  political  changes,  and  that  the  whole 
course  of  literature  at  the  present  time  is  in  the  direction 
of  democracy.  Certainly  the  novel  has  shown  the  way, 
and  the  most  important  original  literary  form  of  modern 
times  has  owed  the  greater  part  of  its  strength  to  the  fact 
that  it  has  studied  humanity,  and  where  it  has,  in  the 
natural  course  of  events,  grown  artificial,  it  has  found  new 
strength  by  returning  to  the  study  of  real  life.     We  shall 


Enylish  Literature.  301 

have  further  instances  of  this  as  we  go  on  with  our  inves- 
tigation of  literature. 

That  the  "  Lazarillo  "  was  popular  cannot  be  doubted. 
It  ran  through  Spain  like  wildfire  ;  it  was  translated  into 
French,  English,  and  German.  The  first  English  transla- 
tion appeared  in  1586 — thirty-three  years  after  the  first 
publication — and  was  followed  by  many  more.  The  nine- 
teenth appeared  in  lYVV  (the  twentieth  in  1789),  which  is 
about  ten  editions  a  century,  or  one  every  ten  years. 
Naturally  enough,  the  success  of  this  novel  inspired 
other  writers  to  the  imitation  of  this  form  of  writing. 
One  of  the  finest  was  Matthew  Aleman's  "Life  of  Guz- 
man de  Alfarache  "  (1599),  of  which  twenty-five  Spanish 
editions  soon  appeared,  as  well  as  tAvo  French  transla- 
tions, one  by  Le  Sage  ;  a  German  translation  in  1615  ; 
and  English  translations  in  1623,  1630,  1634,  and  1656, 
under  the  name  of  "  The  Rogue,  or  the  Life  of  Guzman 
de  Alfarache."  *  The  hero  is  the  son  of  a  Genoese 
merchant,  who  had  settled  in  Spain.  After  his  death, 
tlie  young  fellow  runs  away  from  home  and  begins  his 
adventures.  On  reaching  Madrid,  he  starts  in  life  as  a 
beggar,  and  comments  on  the  motley  crowd  that  passes 
him  as  he  stations  himself  at  the  street-corner.  Soon  he 
sets  up  as  a  sharper,  and  is  forced  to  betake  himself  to 
Toledo,  where  he  plays  the  part  of  a  man  of  fashion  until 
all  his  money  is  lost  or  spent,  when  he  goes  to  Barcelona, 
and  thence,  via  Genoa,  to  Rome,  the  paradise  of  beggars. 
One  of  the  most  amusing  of  the  incidents  is  his  ingenuity 
in  painting  Jiis  leg  in  such  a  way  that  it  deceived  a  cardi- 
nal, who  imagined  him  very  ill,  and  had  him  taken  to  his 
own  house  to  be  cared  for  by  physicians.  One  of  them 
Guzman  overhears  declaring  the  ailment  is  a  fraud — he 

*  Fielding  says  "  The  Spanish  Rogue "  was  Jonathan  Wild's  favorite 
book  ("  Jonathan  Wild."  chap.  iii.). 


302  English  Literature. 

had  once  already  been  flogged  when  detected  in  this  de- 
ception by  neglecting  to  whiten  his  ruddy  cheeks — and 
Guzman  runs  in,  acknowledges  his  sins,  but  shows  the 
doctors  that  it  will  be  much  more  lucrative  for  them  to 
pretend  to  carry  him  through  a  long  illness.  To  this 
they  consent,  and  he  gradually  becomes  a  miraculous 
cure.  He  remains  here  long  as  a  page,  playing  various 
tricks,  then  he  makes  his  way  through  Italy  back  to 
Spain,  where  he  marries.  This  marriage  proves  unfortu- 
nate, and  after  his  wife's  death  Guzman  enters  the  uni- 
versity of  Alcala,  in  order  to  obtain  a  benefice.  He 
marries  again  ;  a  worthless  wife  she  proves  to  be,  but 
no  worse  than  her  husband,  who  finally,  when  he  and 
his  wife  are  banished  from  Madrid,  becomes  the  cham- 
berlain of  an  old  lady,  but  manages  her  affairs  so  ill 
that  he  is  arrested  and  sent  to  the  galleys.  His  fellow- 
slaves  try  to  engage  him  to  enter  a  plot  to  deliver  the 
vessels  to  the  corsairs  ;  he  betrays  the  plot,  receives  his 
freedom  for  a  reward,  and  employs  his  time  in  writing 
his  life.  This  story,  too,  like  "Gil  Bias"  and  "Don 
Quixote,"  contains  many  episodes.  The  fashion  of  epi- 
sodes was  long  lived.  AVe  find  them  in  Fielding  and 
Smollett,  in  Goethe's  "  Wilhelm  Meister,"  and  in  "  Sand- 
ford  and  Merton." 

Then  comes  the  "  Life  of  Paul  the  Sharper,"  by  Que- 
vedo  (1580-1645),  one  of  the  most  distinguished  men  of 
his  day.  He  was  a  profound  scholar,  and  an  eminent 
writer  on  moral  and  political  philosophy,  as  well  as  a 
famous  poet,  who,  at  the  age  of  twenty-three,  was  honored 
by  the  praise  of  Lipsius  and  all  his  learned  contemporaries. 
He  is  of  interest,  too,  as  the  first  man  Avho  is  mentioned  in 
history  as  having  gone  to  live  in  a  hotel  in  order  to  be 
freed  from  domestic  cares.  He  must  have  known  other 
counter-sorrows,  if  the  account  of  the  inns  of  the  time  con- 


English  Literature.  303 

tained  in  most  of  the  picaresque  novels  are  to  be  believed, 
and  the  accuracy  of  their  writers  may  be  attested  by  all 
who  have  travelled  in  Spain.  This  novel  is  perhaps  the 
wittiest  of  all.*  It  begins  thus  :  "  I  was  born  at  Segovia; 
my  father's  name  was  Clement  Paul,  a  native  of  the  same 
town  ;  I  hope  his  soul  is  in  heaven.  I  need  not  speak  of 
his  virtues,  for  these  are  unknown,  but  by  trade  he  was  a 
barber,  though  so  high  -  minded  that  he  took  it  for  an 
affront  to  be  called  by  any  name  but  that  of  a  tonsor  of 
beards,  or  the  gentleman's  hair-dresser.  They  say  he 
came  of  a  good  stock, — and  it  must  have  been  a  vine- 
stock, — as  all  his  actions  showed  a  remarkable  affection 
for  the  refined  blood  of  that  glorious  genealogical  tree." 
But  I  shall  quote  no  more.  I  have  not  forgotten  that  we 
are  studying  English,  not  Spanish,  literature.  There  were, 
besides,  "  La  Picara  Justina"  (1605)  ;  and  the  "History 
of  the  Life  of  the  Esquire  Marcos  de  Obregon"  (1618), 
which  was  of  great  service  in  the  construction  of  "  Gil 
Bias." 

That  the  picaresque  novels  owed  much,  especially  the 
earliest  of  them,  to  the  Italian  stories,  we  may  readily  be- 
lieve. But  they  differ  from  the  originals,  if  originals  they 
were,  by  the  fact  that  they  compose  a  long  and  coherent 
novel,  the  different  chapters  of  which  remind  us  of  some 
of  the  separate  Italian  tales.  In  justice  to  the  Spaniards, 
we  must  remember  the  greatness  of  the  stej)  they  made  in 
making  whole  novels,  and  in  tracing  the  gradual  modifica- 
tions of  character  which  are  required  in  stories  of  this  sort. 
Those  I  have  mentioned,  however,  were  not  all.  Cervantes 
wrote  some  short  stories:  his  "  Exemplary  Novels  "  abound 
in  the  humor  of  the  picaresque  school,  and,  as  I  have  said, 
the  "  Don  Quixote"  contains  much  that  is  inspired  by  them, 

*  This  "  Paul  the  Sharper"  was  translated  in  1657. 


304  English  Literature. 

especially  the  whole  of  Sancho  Panza's  relation  to  the  Don, 
His  cowardice,  shiftiness,  and  comic  treatment  of  every- 
thing are  part  of  the  same  thing.  There  is,  of  course,  this 
great  difference,  that  "  Don  Quixote  "  is  one  of  the  great 
books  of  the  world,  while  the  others  are  but  clever  tales. 

The  picaresque  noA^els,  as  I  have  said,  spread  over  Eu- 
rope, and  inspired  countless  imitations.  Even  in  Germany 
the  inspiration  was  felt.  Grimmelshausen  (1625-76)  wrote 
his  "  Simplicissimus  "  (1668),  the  hero  of  which,  in  one  of 
the  continuations,  retires  to  a  desert  island,  where  he  lives 
for  some  time.  We  shall  have  occasion  to  refer  to  this  in- 
cident when  we  speak  of  "  Robinson  Crusoe."  This  novel 
inspired  many  others  of  a  similar  kind.  In  France,  too,  the 
■picaresque  novels  had  great  influence.  The  best  of  the 
French  imitations  was  Sorel's  "  Histoire  Comique  de  Fran- 
cion"  (1622  and  1633),  a  book  now  nearly  forgotten,  but 
in  its  time  enormously  admired.*  Sorel  wrote  another 
volume,  "  Le  Berger  Extravagant,"  ridiculing  the  pastoral 
stories.  In  the  "  Francion  "  we  have  the  life  of  a  rogue 
told  with  great  fidelity,  and  the  story  is  especially  valuable 
for  the  light  it  throws  on  the  life  of  the  time.  All  the 
complicated  society  of  France,  early  in  the  seventeenth  cen- 
tury, is  mirrored  here;  whole  classes  of  people  pass  before 
us  in  review,  a  chapter,  for  instance,  being  devoted  to  a 
delineation  of  the  literary  men  of  that  day.f     Then  came 

*  In  English,  by  several  hands,  1703. 

f  Sorel,  in  "  L'Ordre  et  I'Examen  des  Livres  Attribues  h  I'Auteur  de  la 
BiblioUieqiie  Fran9aise  "  (quoted  in  Demogeot,  "  Litt.  fian^aise  au  XVIP 
Sieele,"  p.  327, note):  "  Xos  ronians  comiques  sont  cliaeun  autant  d'originaux 
qui  nous  repiesentent  les  caracteres  les  plus  supportables  et  les  plus  diver- 
tissants  de  la  vie  humaine,  et  qui  n'ont  point  leur  sujet  des  gueux,  des  vo- 
leurs,  et  des  faquins,  comme  Gasman,  Lazarille,  et  Buscon ;  mais  des 
horames  de  bonne  condition,  subtils,  genereux,  et  agr6ables  .  ,  .  et,  de  ce 
cuik,  nous  n'avons  rien  k  envier  aux  Strangers." 


EngllaJi  Literature.  305 

Scarron's  "Roman  Comique"  (1651),  which  tells  of  the 
adventures  of  a  company  of  strolling  players.  They  had 
just  left  one  town  because  their  doorkeeper  had  murdered 
an  officer,  and  they  reach  another,  and  agree  to  act  that 
night  in  the  tennis-court.  Since,  however,  the  full  com- 
pany was  not  expected  until  the  next  day,  they  are  in 
some  distress  about  the  smallness  of  their  number — two 
men  and  one  woman.  One  of  the  men,  however,  says  that 
he  once  performed  a  play  alone,  acting  as  king,  queen,  and 
ambassador  in  a  single  scene.  Their  clothes,  too,  are  an- 
other source  of  trouble,  for  the  key  of  the  wardrobe  is  in 
the  hands  of  one  of  the  other  party.  An  official,  however, 
solves  the  matter  by  giving  the  actress  a  robe  of  his  wife's, 
and  the  coats  of  two  young  men  who  are  playing  tennis. 
So  the  play  begins,  and  goes  on  with  some  interruptions, 
the  young  men,  who  have  finished  their  match,  rushing  on 
the  stage  to  reclaim  their  clothes.  This  matter  excites  a 
tunlult,  in  which  the  audience  takes  part.  The  story  runs 
on,  the  company  is  invited  out  to  supper,  the  actress  is 
abducted,  and  the  pursuit  of  her  is  what  takes  up  most  of 
the  rest  of  the  book.  There  is  love-making,  too,  and  a 
comical  description  of  the  absurdities  of  the  incongruous 
characters,  and  much  space  is  devoted  to  exaggerated 
accounts  of  their  misfortunes.  The  book  contains  many 
episodes  in  the  shape  of  love-stories,  the  scenes  of  which 
are  laid  in  Spain.  The  story,  it  will  be  seen,  is  distinctly 
comic,  and  the  manners  of  provincials,  always  despised  by 
Parisians,  are  turned  to  ridicule.*  Another  book  of  the 
same  class  is  Furetiere's  "  Roman  Bourgeois,"  which  de- 
scribes the  ridiculous  courtship  by  a  counsellor  of  the 


*  Boileau  did  not  like  Scarron's  travesties,  but  lie  had  a  good  word  for 
the  "Roman  Comique,"  as  well  as  for  "  Gil  Bias,"  though  he  despised  the 
"Diable  Boiteux." — Sainte-Beuve,  "  Causeries  du  Lundi,"  ii.  357. 


3o6  English  Literature. 

daughter  of  a  rascally  attorney.  It  is  more  or  less  a  car- 
icature. The  greatest  of  the  French  stories,  and  one  of 
the  greatest  of  novels, was  Le Sage's  "Gil Bias"  (1715-35), 
the  scene  of  which  is  laid  in  Spain,  and  the  characters 
are  Spanish,  though  the  book  itself  is,  in  all  essentials, 
French.  Its  dependence  on  the  Spanish  novels,  even  to 
borrowing  some  of  the  incidents,  has  been  often  noticed. 

Now,  at  last,  we  come  to  the  English  novel,  and  this 
long  digression  wall  not  have  been  without  service  if  it 
shows,  by  analogy,  how  certain  it  is  that  the  Spanish  nov- 
els must  have  had  some  influence  on  English  literature. 
Lyly's  "  Euphues  "  had  died  of  its  own  elegance,  and  its 
few  successors,  notably  Greene's  "  Dorastus  and  Fawnia," 
had  left  no  permanent  mark.  The  English  novel  in  no 
way  rose  from  that  artificial  soil.  We  have  seen  that  the 
"Lazarillo"  was  translated  into  English  in  1586,  and  with 
that  book  "  the  Spanish  rogue  "  acquired  the  right  of  citi- 
zenship in  English  letters.  Those  books  had,  however, 
formidable  rivals  in  the  translations  of  the  Italian  novel- 
ists, where  so  many  of  the  dramatists  found  their  plots, 
and  novel-w^riting  was  less  common  w^hen  the  stage  was 
crowded  with  plays,  just  as  now,  when  novels  swarm 
everywhere,  plays  are  rare.  Yet  there  were  some  imi- 
tations of  the  Spanish  stories.  Thomas  Nash  (1558- 
1600)  wrote  a  novel  of  a  somewhat  similar  kind  —  to 
judge  from  the  few  pages  given  in  an  appendix  to  one 
of  the  volumes  of  Dr.  Nott's  edition  of  Surrey's  poems — 
called  "Jack  Wilton."*  Another,  and  possiblv  a  more 
important  imitation,  was  "  The  English  Rogu^'  (part  1 
by  Richard  Head  [died  1678],  2,  3,  and  4  by  Francis  Kirk- 
man,  two  minor  dramatists),  Avhich  was  possibly  a  reac- 
tion against  some  now  forgotten  "  Amadis  "  novels,  diluted 

*  See  also  Observer,  No.  xxxix. 


English  Literature.  307 

fragments  of  chivalry,  such  as  "  The  Famous,  Delectable, 
and  Pleasant  Hystorie  of  the  Renowned  Parismus,  Prince 
of  Bohemia,"  by  Emanuel  Ford,  London,  1598,  which  soon 
ran  through  thirteen  editions,  one  as  late  as  1732  ;  also 
his  "  Ornatus  and  Artesia,"  and  Henry  Roberts's  "  Phean- 
der,  or  the  Maiden  Knight"  (1595)  *  (not  in  Allibone  ;  vide 
Wolff,  "  Gesch.  des  Romans,"  p.  221-22,  and  Dunlop,  ii. 
384). 

"  The  English  Rogue  "  appeared  in  1665, 1668,  and  1671 
(two  parts).  The  whole  title  is  "  The  English  Rogue  De- 
scribed, in  the  Life  of  Meriton  Latroon,  a  Witty  Extrava- 


*  There  had  been,  too,  a  great  many  short  popular  stories,  called  novels, 
sometimes  merely  jest-books  (Mark  Lemon's,  in  Golden  Treasury  Series, 
is  the  latest  of  these  publications).  Such  were  "Tarleton's  Jests"  (1611); 
"Merrie  Conceited  Jests  of  George  Peele"  (1627).  Thomas  Deloney's 
"Pleasant  History  of  John  Winchcomb  in  his  younger  yeeres  called  Jack 
of  Newberrie,  the  famous  and  worthie  clothier  of  England :  declaring  his 
life  and  love,  together  with  his  charitable  deeds  and  great  hospitality : 
and  how  he  set  continually  five  hundred  poore  people  at  worke,  to  the 
great  benefit  of  the  Common-wealth :  worthy  to  be  read  and  regarded," 
licensed  1596,  and  soon  printed,  is  a  curious  mixture  of  novel  and  jest- 
book.  With  but  a  feeble  plot,  it  is  scarcely  more  than  a  collection  of  in- 
coherent stories.  Thomas  Deloncy  was  a  great  ballad-maker,  and.  War- 
ton  says,  one  of  the  original  actors  of  Shakspere's  plays.  In  the  preface 
of  the  "  Tinker  of  Turvey,"  five  or  six  short  stories  of  faithless  wives,  the 
writer  says  a  good  wife  may  find  it  as  well  worth  reading  as  "  Robin 
Hood,"  "  Glim  a  the  Clough,"  "  Tom  Thumb,"  "  Fryer  and  the  Boy,"  and 
"  Sir  Irenbras."  Now,  such  of  these  as  are  known  are  the  reading  of  in- 
fants. "Jack  the  Giant-killer"  is  from  "Sir  Geoffrey  of  Monmouth." 
"  Valentine^and  Orson  "  was  once  a  popular  story.  See,  too,  Goethe's  "  Aus 
Meinem  Leben  "  (30  vol.  ed.,  Stuttgart,  1858),  p.  30,  where  he  speaks  of  the 
romances  he  read  when  young.  May  not  Scott's  novels  be  gradually  sink- 
ing in  this  way  to  younger  readers  ?  The  change  is  not  in  romance  alone; 
A.  De  Morgan  {Notes  and  Queries,  July  17, 1858)  says  that  boys  of  eighteen 
now  read  Newton's  "  Principia,"  which  not  a  dozen  men  in  Europe  could 
read  at  its  first  appearance. 


3o8  Engl'mh  Literature. 

gant.  Being  a  Compleat  History  of  the  Most  Eminent 
Cheats  of  both  Sexes."     Motto, 

"  Read,  but  don't  Practice :  for  the  Author  findes, 
They  which  hve  Honest  have  most  quiet  niindes." 

The  mere  title  shows  that  this  book  is  an  imitation  of  the 
picaresque  stories  ;  and,  if  doubt  were  possible,  it  would 
be  removed  by  one  of  the  commendatory  poems,  by  one 
N.  D.,  who  says  : 

"Guzman,  Lazaro,  Buscon,*  and  Francion, 
Till  thou  appeard'st  did  shine  as  at  high  Noon. 
Tliy  Book's  now  extant ;  those  that  judge  of  Wit, 
Say,  They  and  Rablais  too  fall  short  of  it. 
How  could't  be  otherwise,  since  'twas  thy  fate, 
To  practise  what  they  did  but  imitate,"  etc. 

The  hero  recounts  his  tricks  at  considerable  length,  and 
without  a  trace  of  the  humor  of  his  Spanish  predecessors. 
He  was  a  bad  boy  at  home  and  at  school,  and  of  course 
he  ran  away,  soon  joining  a  band  of  gypsies,  whose  cant 
language  he  describes  at  some  length.  He  leaves  them 
and  becomes  a  professional  beggar,  until  "  a  tradesman 
of  no  mean  quality,  passing  by,  took  a  strong  fancy  to 
me,"  and  carried  him  home  to  take  him  into  his  service. 
Here  he  plunges  into  various  excesses,  which  form  an 
incoherent  combination  of  villanies.  He  leaves  England 
and  travels  in  Ireland.  Then,  "having  now  gotten  a 
round  sum  of  money  by  me,  I  borrowed  wherever  I 
could,  so  crossing  St.  George's  Channel  and  landed  at 
Chester,  I  took  up  my  quarters  at  a  very  graceful  inn,  and 
gave  out  immediately  that  I  had  an  hundred  head  of  Cat- 
tel  coming.  The  iMaster  of  the  house,  taking  notice  of 
my  extraordinary  Garb,  and  believing  the  report  which  I 
had  caus'd  to  be  spread  abroad,  lodg'd  me  with  much  re- 

*  Buscon  is  another  name  for  Paul  the  Sharper. 


English  Literatur^e.  309 

spect  in  one  of  the  best  Chambers  of  his  house.  The  wind 
favoured  my  design  as  much  as  I  could  desire,  for  it  blew 
East  North  East,  by  which  no  Shipping  could  come  out  of 
Ireland.  One  day  I  came  to  my  landlord,  and  telling  him 
that  by  reason  of  the  non-arrival  of  my  Cattel,  I  was  dis- 
appointed of  Moneys,  and  therefore  I  desired  him  to  lend 
me  ten  pounds,  and  he  should  satisfie  himself  in  the  first 
choice  of  the  best  of  my  beasts  when  they  came,  and 
swore  to  him  I  would  perform  my  promise  to  him  upon 
the  word  of  a  Gentleman.  So  that  without  any  scruple 
he  lent  me  the  money.  Being  Market-Day  I  bought  an 
excellent  gelding  with  Furniture  thereunto  belonging, 
with  Sword  and  Pistols,  and  in  this  Equipage  mounted  I 
took  my  leave  of  my  credulous  Landlord,  without  speak- 
ing a  word  to  him,"  etc.  We  notice  the  total  lack  of 
vivacity  in  this  narration,  and  its  enormous  inferiority  to 
the  Spanish  stories.  The  poor  author  beats  liis  brain  to 
find  incidents,  but  his  dreary  pen  leaves  them  all  heavy. 
The  hero  served  a  notable  revengeful  trick  on  the  turnkey 
of  Ludgate,  he  played  a  freak  upon  a  jeweller,  he  put  a 
notable  cheat  upon  a  gentleman,  he  cheated  a  scrivener, 
he  was  revenged  on  a  broker,  he  cozened  a  rich  usurer,  etc. 
Suddenly  he  is  in  Newgate,  and  (1650)  condemned  to  be 
transported  to  Virginia  ;  he  is  wrecked  on  the  coast  of 
Spain,  and  then  starts  anew,  this  time  of  his  own  will,  for 
the  East  Indies,  but  the  ship  is  captured  by  Turkish  pirates, 
and  he  is  sold  in  the  market-place  ;  he  regains  his  liberty, 
however,  and  pushes  on  to  the  East  Indies,  where  he  mar- 
ries a  native  woman.  Here  the  part  written  by  Head 
comes  to  an  end.  Kirkman's  continuation  begins  with 
another  man's  memories  of  his  life  and  its  misdeeds.  The 
book  is  prolonged  with  the  full  confessions  of  a  number 
of  evil-doers  of  both  sexes.  A  certain  amount  of  infor- 
mation may  be  got  of  the  life  of  the  time  ;  but,  though 


310  English  Literature. 

the  book  is  of  infinitely  less  literary  merit  than  the  French 
and  Spanish  stories,  the  vulgar  tale  shows  the  effect  that 
the  picaresque  novels  had. 

While  "The  English  Rogue"  belongs  to  a  low  depart- 
ment of  literature,  what  strikes  any  one  who  reads  it  is  its 
resemblance  to  Defoe's  secondary  novels,  as  Lamb  called 
them.  It  is  true  that  these  stories  are  floated  by  the  "  Rob- 
inson Crusoe  ;"  if  that  novel  had  never  been  written,  we 
should  know  but  little  of  "  Colonel  Jack,"  "  Roxana,"  and 
"  Caj^tain  Singleton."  Fortunately,  however,  they  survive, 
and  we  can  trace  the  foundations  of  the  English  novel  in 
them  as  in  "  The  English  Rogue,"  although  these  founda- 
tions were  laid  in  miry  places.  Defoe  had  from  nature 
what  he  calls  his  "  natural  infirmity  of  homely,  plain  writ- 
ing," but  he  did  not  invent — although  he  often*  gets  the 
credit  for  it — the  art  of  writing  about  the  lives  of  vicious 
people.  In  his  volume  on  Defoe,  in  the  "  English  Men  of 
Letters  Series,"  for  instance,  Mr.  Minto  says  :  "  Defoe  is 
spoken  of  as  the  inventor  of  the  realistic  novel ;  realistic 
biography  would,  perhaps,  be  a  more  strictly  accurate  de- 
scription." In  fact,  Defoe  invented  neither;  he  found  the 
realistic  biographical  novel  already  made,  and  he  adapted 
the  form  to  his  own  ends.  He  did  this  with  great  skill, 
for  while  he  was  not  a  great  artist,  he  was  a  wonderful 
craftsman.  That  is  to  say,  he  studies  his  fellow-creatures 
from  the  point  of  view  of  their  relations  to  society  ;  he 
writes  as  a  reformer  w^ith  a  direct  practical  end,  with  the 
end  that  was  foremost  in  the  minds  of  his  generation,  that 
of  promoting  civilization.  Take  his  "Robinson  Crusoe," 
for  example  ;  full  as  it  is  of  fine  things,  as  when  Robinson 
sees  with  terror  the  print  of  a  human  foot  upon  the  sand, 
it  is  singularly  devoid  of  any  expression  of  the  feeling  of 
vast  loneliness  that  would  weigh  down  on  the  spirit  of 
any  such  hero  in  a  novel  of  the  present  day.     The  prob- 


English  Literature.  311 

lem  that  lay  before  him,  and  which  he  accomplished,  was 
how  to  make  himself  over  from  a  worthless  person  into  a 
peaceable,  God-fearing  citizen.  The  shadow  of  the  mu- 
nicipal law  and  of  the  English  Sunday  seems  to  lie  over 
the  lonely  island.  The  moral  of  the  book,  in  short,  is  this  : 
If  a  man  in  solitude,  with  a  few  scraps  from  a  wreck  and 
an  occasional  savage,  dog,  and  cat  to  help  him,  can  lead  so 
civilized  a  life,  what  may  we  not  expect  of  good  people  in 
England  with  abundance  about  them  ?  This  moral  is  what 
now  makes  the  value  of  the  book  as  a  means  of  education 
for  boys,  that  they  may  see,  as  Rousseau  put  it,  that  the 
stock  of  an  ironmonger  is  better  than  that  of  a  jeweller, 
and  glass  better  than  diamonds.*  Indeed,  the  w^hole  book 
appeals  to  a  boy's  imagination  by  its  continual  reference 
to  practical  difliculties  and  by  the  absence  of  a  larger 
imagination.  Of  the  influence  of  this  book  it  is  hardly 
necessary  to  speak,  for  its  position  as  a  classic  for  boys  is 
still  firm.  It  appeared  in  1719,  and  was  soon  followed 
by  many  English  imitations,  one  of  which  was  the  "  Life 
and  Adventures  of  Peter  Wilkins  "  (1750),  by  Robert 
Paltock,  but  it  had  a  much  larger  following  abroad.  A 
French  translation  appeared  in  1720-21 ;  in  1720  it  was  put 
into  German  and  soon  into  Italian,  Everyw  here  the  book 
was  much  admired,  but  nowhere  so  much  as  in  Germany. 
By  1760  forty  "  Robinsonaden,"  as  they  were  called,  were 
published,  including  a  German  (1722),  an  Italian  (1722), 
a  "  Schlesischer  Robinson,"  and  one  of  almost  every  coun- 
try ;  the  clerical  "Robinson"  (1723);  a  medical,  a  Jew- 
ish, a  moral,  a  learned,  a  poetic  "Robinson  ;"  the  "Girl 
Robinson;"  "Robinson,  the  Bookseller;"  an  "Invisible 
Robinson,"  etc.  Twenty-one  more,  indeed,  appeared  af- 
ter 1760,  exclusive  of  those  written  solely  for  children,  the 

♦  "Emile,"  liv.  iii. 


312  English  Literature. 

best  known  of  which  is  Campe's  "  Swiss  Family  Robin- 
son," who,  it  will  be  remembered,  land  in  wash-tubs  nailed 
together  between  planks — a  device  which  throws  consider- 
able light  on  a  German's  notion  of  the  ocean  in  a  storm. 

It  is  Defoe's  other  novels  that  had  more  influence  on 
English  literature,  or  at  least  inclined  more  towards  the 
direction  which  English  literature  was  to  follow.  In  his 
"Colonel  Jack"  (1722),  for  instance,  we  are  once  more 
in  the  line  between  the  picaresque  novel  and  the  English 
novel  made  up  of  the  study  of  character  and  the  combina- 
tion of  incident.  The  hero  tells  in  autobiographical  form 
the  story  of  his  life,  and  it  is  impossible  to  pass  by  his  chron- 
icle without  quoting  a  few  lines  to  show  of  how  good  ma- 
terial the  book  is  made.  The  hero,  who  has  gentle  blood 
in  his  veins,  is  brought  up  amid  thieves  and  pickpockets, 
whose  arts  he  has  soon  learned  to  practise.  The  moral 
agnosticism  of  the  poor  fellow,  who  was  brought  up  to 
believe  the  picking  of  pockets  a  legitimate  business,  like 
anything  else,  is  well  given  ;  he  has  no  struggle  with  his 
conscience,  he  simply  does  as  he  is  bid,  although  when 
older  he  regrets  that  his  victims  suffer  the  agony  of  losing 
large  sums.  At  one  time  he  returns  a  stolen  pocket-book 
for  the  sake  of  the  reward.  The  gentleman  becomes  in- 
terested in  him,  and  talks  with  him  thus  : 

"  '  Wliat  is  your  name  ?'  says  he — '  But  liold,  I  forgot,'  said  he;  '  I  prom- 
ised I  would  not  ask  your  name,  so  you  need  not  tell  me.' 
"  '  My  name  is  Jack,'  said  I. 
"  '  Why,  have  you  no  surname  V  said  he. 
"  '  What  is  that  ?'  said  I. 

"  'You  have  some  other  name  besides  Jack,'  says  he,  '  han't  you  ?' 
"  'Yes,'  says  I ;  '  they  call  me  Colonel  Jack.' 
"  '  But  have  you  no  other  name  ?' 
"  'No,'  said  I. 

"  '  How  come  you  to  be  calK'd  Colonel  Jack,  pray  ?' 
"  ■  Tliov  say,'  said  I,  '  that  mv  fatlicr'.<  name  was  Colonel.' 


English  Literature.  313 

"  '  Is  your  father  or  mother  alive  V  said  he. 

"  '  No,'  said  I, '  my  father  is  dead.' 

"  '  Where  is  your  mother,  then  ?'  said  he. 

"  '  I  never  had  e'er  a  mother,'  said  I. 

"This  made  him  laugh.  'What,'  said  he,  'had  you  never  a  mother; 
what  then  V 

"  '  I  had  a  nurse,'  said  I, '  but  she  was  not  my  mother.' 

" '  Well,'  says  he  to  the  gentleman,  '  I  dare  say  this  boy  was  not  the 
thief  that  stole  your  bills.' 

"  '  Indeed,  sir,  I  did  not  steal  them,'  said  I,  and  cried  again. 

"  '  No,  no,  child,'  said  he, '  we  don't  believe  you  did.  This  is  a  clever 
boy,'  says  he  to  the  other  gentleman,  '  and  yet  very  ignorant  and  honest ; 
'tis  pity  some  care  should  not  be  taken  of  him,  and  something  done  for 
him;  let  us  talk  a  little  more  with  him.'  So  they  sat  down  and  drank 
wine,  and  gave  me  some,  and  then  the  first  gentleman  talked  to  me  again. 

"  '  Well,'  said  he,  '  what  wilt  thou  do  with  this  money  now  thou  hast  it  V 

"  '  I  don't  know,'  said  I. 

"  '  Where  will  you  put  it  ?'  said  he. 

" '  In  my  pocket,'  said  I. 

"  ' In  your  pocket,'  said  he ;  'is  your  pocket  whole  ?  sha'n't  you  lose  it ?' 

"  '  Yes,'  said  I,  '  my  pocket  is  whole.' 

"  '  And  where  will  you  put  it  when  you  come  home  ?' 

"  '  I  have  no  home,'  said  I,  and  cried  again. 

"  '  Poor  child  !'  said  he  ;  '  then  what  dost  thou  do  for  thy  living  ?' 

"  '  I  go  of  errands,'  said  I,  '  for  the  folks  in  Rosemary-lane.' 

"  'And  what  dost  thou  do  for  a  lodging  at  night?'" 

"  '  I  lie  at  the  glass-house,'  said  I,  'at  night.' 

"  '  How,  lie  at  the  glass-house !  have  they  any  beds  there  ?'  said  he. 

"  '  I  never  lay  in  a  bed  in  my  life,'  said  I,  '  as  I  remember.' 

"  '  Why,'  says  he, '  what  do  you  lie  on  at  the  glass-house  V 

"  '  The  ground,'  says  I,  '  and  sometimes  a  little  straw,  or  upon  the  warm 
ashes,' "  etc. 

Here  Defoe  describes  one  of  tlie  performances  of  a 
young  rascal : 

"  How  he  did  to  whip  away  such  a  bag  of  money  from  any  man  that 
was  awake  and  in  his  senses,  I  cannot  tell ;  but  there  was  a  great  deal  in 
it,  and  among  it  a  paper  full  by  itself.  When  the  paper  dropt  out  of  the 
bag,  '  Hold,'  says  he,  '  that  is  gold !'  and  began  to  crow  and  hollow  like  a 
mad  boy.     But  there  he  was  baulked,  for  it  was  a  paper  of  old  thirteen- 

14 


314  English  Literature. 

pence  halfpeiiny  pieces,  half  aiul  quarter  pieces,  with  nincpences,  and  four- 
pence  halfpennies — all  old  crooked  money — Scotch  and  Irish  coin  ;  so  he 
was  disappointed  in  that:  but  as  it  was,  there  was  about  £17  or  £18  in 
the  bag,  as  I  understood  by  him ;  for  I  could  not  tell  money,  not  I." 

These  inadequate  quotations  must  suffice  to  show  the 
similarity  in  the  subjects  between  the  Spanish  picaresque 
stories  and  Defoe's  novels  ;  they  bear,  too,  a  striking  re- 
semblance to  some  of  the  scenes  in  Grimmelshausen's 
" Simplicissimus." *    And  "Colonel  Jack"  is  not  the  only 

*  For  example,  Erstes  Buch,  Capitel  8 : 

"  Einsiedd.  Wie  heissestu  ? 

"  Shnplicius.  Ich  heisse  Bub. 

"  Ei7is.  Ich  sihe  wohl,  dass  du  kein  Miigdlein  bist;  wie  hat  dich  aber 
dein  Vater  und  Mutter  gerufen  ? 

^^  Simp.  Ich  habe  keinen  Vater  odor  Mutter  gehabt. 

"  M71S.  Wer  hat  dir  dann  das  llemd  geben? 

"  Sirup.  Ei,  mein  Mender. 

"  Bins.  Wie  heisset  dich  dann  dein  Meuder  ? 

^^  Simp.  Sie  hat  mich  Bub  geheissen,auch  Schclm,  ungeschickter  Tolpel 
und  Galgenvogel. 

"  M)is.  Wer  ist  dann  dciner  Mutter  Mann  gewest  ? 

"  Simp.  Niemand. 

"  Eins.  Bei  wem  hat  dann  dein  Meuder  des  Nachts  geschlafen  ? 

"  Simp.  Bei  raeineni  Knan. 

"  Eins.  Wie  hat  dich  dann  dein  Knan  gcheisscn  ? 

*'  Simp.  Er  hat  mich  auch  Bub  gencnnet. 

"  Eins.  Wie  hiesse  aber  dein  Knan  ? 

"  Simp.  Er  heisst  Knan. 

"  Eins.  Wie  hat  ihn  aber  dein  Meuder  gerufen  ? 

"(Simp.  Knan  und  auch  Meister. 

"  Eins.  Hat  sie  ihn  niemals  anders  genennet  ? 

"  Simp.  Ja,  sie  hat. 

"  Eins.  Wie  dann  ? 

"  Simp.  Riilp,  grober  Bengel,  voile  Sau  und  noch  wol  anders,  wann  sie 
hadeite. 

"Eins.  Du  bist  wol  ein  unwisscnder  Tropf,  dass  du  wedur  dciner  Eltern 
noch  dcincn  eigncn  Xanicii  nicht  wcist ! 


English  Literature.  3^5 

example  ;  the  "  Memoirs  of  a  Cavalier,"  which  Dr.  John- 
son thought  genuine,  the  "  Captain  Singleton,"  and  I  may 
even  include  the  "History  of  the  Plague,"  which  has  to 
be  shown  up  every  few  years  for  an  imaginary  account, 
and  the  "Moll  Flanders"  and  "  Roxana" — all  the  genuine 
novels  of  this  list  describe  vicious  characters  and  advent- 
urous careers.  As  in  the  Spanish  novels,  the  most  strik- 
ing thing  is  the  picturesque  setting  ;  the  novels,  indeed, 
are  like  some  of  the  modern  French  pictures — the  French 
novels  are  mainly  satirical,  and  Defoe's  contain  practical 
morality.  He  always  teaches  a  lesson.  We  have  seen 
liow  he  did  this  even  in  his  "  Robinson  Crusoe."  One  of 
the  few  exceptions  is  when,  after  the  Spanish  ship  was 
wrecked  with  all  on  board,  Robinson  says  :  "  Such  were 
these  earnest  wishings,  '  That  but  one  man  had  been 
saved  !  O  that  it  had  been  but  one  !'  I  believe  I  repeat- 
ed the  words,  '  O  that  it  had  been  but  one  !'  a  thousand 
times  ;  and  my  desires  were  so  moved  by  it  that  when  I 
spoke  the  words,  my  hands  would  clinch  together,  and  my 
fingers  press  the  palms  of  my  hands,  that  if  I  had  had  any 
soft  thing  in  my  hand,  it  would  have  crushed  it  involun- 
tarily ;  and  my  teeth  in  my  head  would  strike  together, 
and  set  against  one  another  so  strong,  that  for  some  time 
I  could  not  part  them  again."  And,  chap.  viii.  :  "Before, 
as  I  walked  about,  either  on  my  hunting,  or  for  viewing 
the  country,  the  anguish  of  my  soul  at  my  condition  would 
break  out  upon  me  on  a  sudden,  and  my  very  heart  would 
die  within  me  to  think  of  the  woods,  the  mountains,  the 
deserts  I  was  in  ;  and  how  I  was  a  prisoner,  locked  up 
with  the  eternal  bars  and  bolts  of  the  ocean,  in  an  unin- 

"  S\mp.  Eia,  weist  dus  doch  auch  nicht. 
"  Eins.  Kanstu  auch  beten  ? 

'■'■  Shnj).  Nain,  unser  Ann,  uiid  mein  Meuder   liaben  als  das   Bett  ge- 
macht." 


3i6  English  Literature. 

habited  wilderness  without  redemption.  In  the  midst  of 
the  greatest  composures  of  my  mind,  tliis  would  break  out 
upon  me  like  a  storm,  and  made  me  wring  my  hands,  and 
weep  like  a  child.  Sometimes  it  would  take  me  in  the 
middle  of  my  work,  and  I  would  immediately  sit  down 
and  sigh,  and  look  upon  the  ground  for  an  hour  or  two 
together,  and  this  was  still  worse  to  me  ;  for  if  I  could 
burst  out  into  tears,  or  vent  myself  by  words,  it  would 
go  off  ;  and  the  grief,  having  exhausted  itself,  would 
abate." 

These  passages  show  that  Defoe  was  by  no  means  in- 
sensible to  the  romantic  interest  of  the  situation  he  de- 
scribed with  such  great  skill,  but  in  general  he  confined 
himself,  as  we  all  know,  to  the  description  of  facts.  His 
homely  narratives — that  is,  all  his  stories  except  "  Robin- 
son Crusoe" — have  always  belonged  to  the  lower  stratum 
of  literature,  but  the  spirit  that  inspired  them  has  never 
become  wholly  extinct.  He,  to  be  sure,  limited  him- 
self to  a  sordid  method,  to  the  dexterous  adaptation,  as 
Mr.  INIinto  says,  of  means  to  ends  ;  but  his  unwearying 
realism  is  still  one  of  the  main  forces  in  the  English 
novel. 

While  it  is  only  the  "Robinson  Crusoe"  that  floats 
Defoe's  other  novels,  this  stands  outside  of  the  regular 
progress  of  the  fiction  of  England,  which  soon  grew  fa- 
mous in  the  hands  of  Richardson.  We  all  know  how  this 
peaceful  printer,  at  the  age  of  fifty-one,  suddenly  burst 
into  autliorsliip,  and  became  one  of  the  most  famous 
writers  of  his  time.  His  own  account  of  this  step  is  well 
worth  consideration,  especially  because  at  first  sight  it 
seems  to  show  that  his  treatment  of  the  novel  was 
wholly  fortuitous,  and  in  no  way  dependent  upon  what 
his  predecessors  had  accomplished.  In  a  letter  to  Aaron 
Hill,  he  said  that  the   foundation  of  the   storv  of  "Pa- 


Entjlltili  Literature.  317 

niela,"  *  in  which  the  heroine  withstands  the  solicita- 
tions of  her  master,  and  finally  induces  him  to  marry 
her,  was  an  anecdote  which  he  had  heard  some  t^venty- 
five  years  earlier.  The  way  in  which  he  happened  to 
write  it  was  this  :  "  Mr.  Rivington  and  Mr.  Osborne, 
whose  names  are  on  the  title-page,  had  long  been  urging 
me  to  give  them  a  little  book  (which,  they  said,  they 
were  often  asked  after)  of  familiar  letters  on  the  use- 
ful concerns  in  common  life  ;  and,  at  last,  I  yielded  to 
their  importunity,  and  began  to  recollect  such  subjects 
as  I  thought  W'Ould  be  useful  in  such  a  design,  and  formed 
several  letters  accordingly.  And,  among  the  rest,  I  thought 
of  giving  one  or  two  as  cautions  to  young  folks  circum- 
stanced as  Pamela  was.  Little  did  I  think,  at  first,  of 
making  one,  much  less  two  volumes  of  it.  But,  when  I 
began  to  recollect  what  had,  so  many  years  before,  been 
told  me  by  my  friend,  I  thought  the  story,  if  written  in  an 
easy  and  natural  manner,  suitable  to  the  simplicity  of  it, 

*  Pamela,  it  is  often  pronounced  now,  althougii  Richardson  doubtless 
said  Pamela.  Thus  in  an  introductory  poem  we  find,  "  Sweet  Pamela,  for 
ever  blooming  maid."  And  in  the  verses  the  heroine  writes  to  her  fellow- 
servants  : 

"  My  fellow-servants  dear,  attend 
To  these  few  lines  which  I  have  penned ; 
Pm  sure  they  are  from  your  honest  friend 
And  wisher-well,  poor  Pamela." 

Pope,  however,  "To  Miss  Blount,  with  works  of  Voiture,"  has 
"The  gods  to  curse  Pamela  with  her  prayers." 

Fielding  says  ("Joseph  Andrews,"  bk.  iv.  chap,  xii.):  "They  had  a 
daughter  of  a  very  strange  name,  Pamela  or  Pamela ;  some  pronounced  it 
one  way,  and  some  the  other." 

In  "A  Remedy  for  Love,"  Sidney  has 

"  Philoclea  and  Pamela  sweet, 
Bv  chance  in  one  great  house  did  meet." 


3i8  English  Literature. 

might  possibly  introduce  a  new  species  of  writing,  that 
might  possibly  turn  young  people  into  a  course  of  reading 
different  from  the  pomp  and  parade  of  romance-writing, 
and  dismissing  the  iinproba})le  and  marvellous,  with  which 
novels  generally  abound,  might  tend  to  promote  the  cause 
of  religion  and  virtue.  I  therefore  gave  way  to  enlarge- 
ment ;  and  so  Pamela  became  as  you  see  her.  But  so  lit- 
tle did  I  hope  for  the  approl)ation  of  judges,  that  I  had  not 
the  courage  to  send  the  two  voliimes  to  your  ladies,  until 
I  found  the  books  well  received  by  the  public. 

"  While  I  was  writing  the  two  volumes,  my  worthy- 
hearted  wife,  and  the  young  lady  who  is  with  us,  when  I 
had  read  them  some  part  of  the  story,  which  I  had  begun 
without  their  knowing  it,  u-sed  to  come  into  my  little 
closet  every  night,  with — '  Have  you  any  more  of  Pamela, 
Mr.  Richardson  ?'  '  We  are  come  to  hear  a  little  more  of 
Pamela,'  etc.  This  encouraged  me  to  prosecute  it,  which 
I  did  so  diligently,  through  all  my  other  business,  that,  by 
a  memorandum  on  my  copy,  I  began  it  Kov.  10,  1739,  and 
finished  it  Jan.  10,  1739-40." 

If  any  book  seems  to  have  been  written  independently 
it  was  this.  Yet  it  is  important  to  notice  that,  by  his  own 
confession,  he  was  desirous  of  writing  something  "  that 
might  possibly  turn  young  people  into  a  course  of  reading 
different  from  the  pomp  and  parade  of  romance  -  writing, 
and  dismissing  the  improbable  and  marvellous,  with  which 
novels  generally  abound,  might  tend  to  promote  the  cause 
of  religion  and  virtue."  We  find  him,  then,  obeying  the 
spirit  of  his  time  by  reacting  against  the  decaying  roman- 
tic novels,  the  heroic  romances  which  were  in  the  lady's 
library  mentioned  by  the  Spectator,  and  following  the  bent 
of  part  of  his  contemporaries  by  teaching  the  importance 
of  virtue.  To  Richardson  the  heroic  romances  seemed 
absurd  and  exaggerated.      He  was  tired  of  the  lovesick 


English  Literature.  319 

emperors  of  imaginary  countries  and  the  fantastic  prin- 
cesses, and  determined  to  show  what  were  the  dangers 
really  surrounding  human  beings  ;  and  he  took  the  only 
means  in  his  power  of  doing  this.  He  described  life  as  he 
knew  it.  Defoe,  there  can  be  no  doubt,  struck  a  lower 
class  of  readers,  and  indeed,  even  now,  when,  naturally 
enough,  there  is  a  strong  tendency  to  admire  any  work  in 
the  past  that  seems  animated  by  the  modern  spirit,  his 
novels  are  simply  the  reading  of  the  curious.  If  further 
proof  is  needed  of  Richardson's  dependence  on  laws 
stronger  than  any  man's  whim,  it  may  be  found  in  the 
fact  that  there  were,  as  Erich  Schmidt  says,  Richardsoni- 
ans  before  Richardson.  The  most  celebrated  of  those  was 
Marivaux  (1688-1763),  who  published  a  French  Spectator 
in  1722,  and  in  1731  published  his  novel  "Marianne," 
M'hich  he  left  unfinished — the  completion  being  added  by 
Mme.  Riccoboni,  a  few  years  later.* 

This  story  is  very  much  like  those  of  Richardson.  The 
heroine  loses  her  parents  at  an  early  age,  and  is  taken  care 
of  by  the  cure  of  the  village  near  by  until  her  sixteenth 
year,  when  his  sister  is  called  to  Paris  to  attend  a  relative 
at  the  point  of  death.  She  takes  Marianne  with  her — 
who  recounts  her  own  adventures — to  find  her  some  em- 
ployment. But  the  cure's  sister  is  taken  ill  and  dies  ;  the 
cure'  himself  falls  into  a  state  of  imbecility  and  has  spent 
all  his  money,  so  that  Marianne  could  not  think  of  return- 
ing to  him.  She  turns  for  succor  to  a  monk  to  whom 
her  friend  had  recommended  her  on  her  death-bed.  She 
is  intrusted  to  a  man  with  a  fine  reputation  for  benevo- 

*  There  is  no  ground  for  affirming  that  Richardson  had  read  it.  Field- 
ing had,  however.  In  "  Joseph  Andrews  "  (1742),  bk.  iii.  chap,  i.,  he  says : 
"Tlie  same  mistaltes  may  be  found  in  Scarron,  the  'Arabian  Nights,'  the 
'  History  of  Marianne,'  and  '  Le  Paisan  Parvenu.'  "  Of  the  "  Paysan  Par- 
venu" a  translation  appeared  in  1735. 


y 


320  Engliali  Literature. 

lence,  who  is,  however,  a  monster  of  hypocrisy.  After 
some  harrowing  scenes  with  this  infamous  persecutor,  one 
day,  on  her  way  home  from  mass,  she  sprains  her  ankle, 
and  is  carried  to  the  house  of  a  M.  Valville,  who,  it  is  un- 
necessary to  add  after  saying  that  the  heroine  had  sprained 
her  ankle,  falls  at  once  madly  in  love  with  her.  This 
young  gentleman  is  the  nephew  of  the  unvenerable  villain 
who  assumes  to  be  her  protector,  and  there  is  much  mis- 
understanding between  the  two  gentlemen  concerning 
each  other's  intentions.  Marianne  finds  refuge  in  a  con- 
vent, where  a  benevolent  lady,  who  overhears  her  story, 
establishes  her.  This  benevolent  lady  soon  confides  to 
Marianne  that  she  is  in  much  distress  because  her  son  has 
just  refused  an  advantageous  marriage  on  account  of  his 
attachment  for  a  young  girl  who  had  been  carried  into 
her  house  after  a  slight  accident.  Marianne  confesses  that 
she  is  the  person,  but,  while  she  declares  that  she  returns 
his  affection,  she  promises  to  do  all  in  her  power  to  deter 
him  from  such  an  unequal  alliance.  Valville,  however, 
does  not  agree  to  this,  and  his  mother  consents  to  the  mar- 
riage. All  seems  happily  concluded,  when  Marianne  is 
reduced  to  despair  by  learning  that  Valville  has  fallen 
madly  in  love  with  another  woman,  and  Marivaux's  part 
of  the  story  concludes  with  a  nun's  recital  of  her  own  woes, 
with  the  purpose  of  distracting  Marianne  from  the  con- 
templation of  her  own  sufferings.  The  continuation  puts 
an  end  to  the  long  episode  about  the  nun,  and  narrates 
how  the  woman  with  whom  Valville  is  in  love  is  an  un- 
worthy intriguer.  He  means  to  elope  with  her  to  Eng- 
land, but  is  prevented  and  put  in  the  Bastile.  An  officer 
falls  in  love  with  Marianne,  but  she,  at  any  rate,  is  con- 
stant and  refuses  him.  Valville  is  taken  sick,  and  Mari- 
anne hastens  to  the  Bastile  to  nurse  him.  He  repents 
his  errors  and  renews  his  attachment ;   it  is  discovered 


English  Literature.  321 

that  she  belongs  to  a  very  noble  family,  and  they  at  last 
marry  happily. 

The  main  idea  of  this  novel  is  the  same  as  that  of 
Richardson's  "  Pamela,"  that  virtue  and  honesty  triumph 
over  all  persecutions  ;  but  in  Marivaux's  novel  the  up- 
rightness is  of  a  higher  kind  than  Pamela's  rigid,  calcu- 
latino-,  bargaining  virtue.  Marianne  is  a  loving  person 
who  is  willino-  to  sacrifice  herself  and  never  see  her 
lover  if  she  stands  in  the  way  of  his  prosperity  ;  Pa- 
mela is  simply  looking  out  for  her  own  advantage.  In 
spite  of  this  difference  between  the  two  books,  they  are 
sufficiently  alike  in  intention  and  in  choice  of  subject. 
They  show  how  similar  causes  produce  similar  results. 
Yet  this  novel  had  no  imitators  in  France,  where  a  few 
years  later  Richardson  was  hailed  with  warmth  as  the 
founder  of  a  new  school. 

In  France,  too,  I  may  say  here,  there  had  been  an  earlier 
reaction  against  the  heroic  novel,  in  Mme.  de  La  Fayette's 
story,  "La  Princesse  de  Cleves,"  a  calm  narrative  of  so- 
cial complication,  as  different  as  possible  from  the  heroic 
novels,  with  their  pompous,  inflated  love-making.  Yet  the 
most  complete  modification  appeared  in  England  ;  the 
"  Princesse  de  Cleves  "  belonged  to  a  more  refined  society 
than  that  of  England,  and  Lee's  play  of  that  name  (1681) 
was  a  base  travesty  of  a  beautiful  novel.  The  reaction 
that  appeared  in  England  was  characteristic  of  that  coun- 
try because  made  up  of  the  elements  that  existed  there. 
As  I  have  said,  the  middle  class  was  more  impoi'tant 
because  more  powerful  there  than  anywhere,  and  as  it 
grew  into  prominence  it  became  impatient  of  the  aris- 
tocratic literature  which  was  fashionable,  and  the  new 
novel  became  a  study  of  the  middle  classes.  Its  moral 
turn  was  that  which  was  popular  with  these  people.  It 
recalls  that  of  the  Sjwcfator,  just  as  the  incidents  are  like 


322  English  Literature. 

the  brief  sketches  which  Addison  and  Steele  were  fond 
of  writing.  The  picaresque  novels,  it  need  scarcely  be 
said,  had  no  influence  on  Richardson,  though  we  shall  soon 
see  them  again  inspiring  other  writers.  He  was  simply 
giving  human  interest  to  fiction  which  for  a  long  time  had 
been  occujiied  with  the  intrigues  of  aristocrats.  Mari- 
vaux's  novel  was  almost  an  accidental  occurrence,  though 
the  result  of  similar  causes,  while  Richardson  founded  a 
school.  Princes  and  princesses  had  to  give  way  to  human 
beings,  when  royal  authority  could  be  made  by  act  of 
parliament,  and  natui*ally  curiosity  was  diverted  to  those 
who  had  the  power  which  was  expressed  by  the  parlia- 
ment. In  England,  too,  the  great  change  from  feudalism 
to  the  modern  industrial  society  was  completed,  and  natu- 
rally the  novel  which  pictured  this  society  was  written 
there. 


English. Literature.  323 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

I,  The  stage,  too,  had  taken  notice  of  the  change.     We 
have    seen  how  artificial  was   Addison's    "  Gato,"  yet  it 
set  a  literary  fashion.     If  even  Addison,  whose  taste  was 
so  much  above  that  of  his  contemporaries,  could  write 
that  cold  tragedy,  need  we  wonder  that  Thomson,  who 
drew  inspirations  for  his  poems  from  Milton  and  Spen- 
ser, should   have    written   a    severely  classical   tragedy  ? 
One  line  of  it  ran,  "  Oh  !   Sophonisba  ;   Sophonisba,  oh  !" 
}     which  some  one  in  the  pit  turned  to  ridicule  by  shouting 
^,     out,  "  Oh  !  Jemmy  Thomson,  Jemmy  Thomson,  oh  !"  and 
'j    which   Fielding   again   laughed   at   in  his   "  Tragedy   of 
';    Tragedies  ;  or,  the  Life  and  Death  of  Tom  Thumb  the 
I    Great"  (1730-31),  in  the  line,  "  Oh  !  Huncamunca,  Hun- 
\   camunca,  oh  !"      This  burlesque  of  Fielding's  is  not  un- 
\  amusing.      It  is  prefaced  with  a  long  essay,  with  mock 
S-eferences  to  Aristotle  and  Horace,  and  there  are  notes 
containing   extracts  from  the  tragedians  who  are  most 
frequently    parodied,    and    caricatures    of    the    pompous 
critics.     Thus,  "Act  i.  sc.  i.,  the  Palace  ;  Doodle,  Noodle: 

"  Doodle.  Sure  such  a  day  as  this  was  never  seen ! 
The  sun  himself,  on  this  auspicious  day, 
Shines  hke  a  beau  in  a  new  biithday  suit : 
This  down  the  seams  embroidered,  that  the  beams, 
All  nature  wears  one  universal  grin. 

"  Note. — Corneille  recommends  some  very  remarkable  day  wherein  to 
fix  the  action  of  a  tragedy.     This  the  best  of  our  tragical  writers  have 


324  Knylish  Literature. 

understood  to  mean  a  day  remarkable  for  the  serenity  of  the  sky,  or  what 
we  generally  call  a  fine  summer's  day  :  so  that,  according  to  this  exposi- 
tion, the  same  months  are  proper  for  tragedy  which  are  proper  for  pastoral. 
Most  of  our  celebrated  English  tragedies,  as  Cato,  Mariwime,  Tanurlane, 
etc.,  begin  with  these  observations  on  the  morning.  Lee  seems  to  have 
come  the  nearest  to  this  beautiful  description  of  our  author's." 

And  then  he  quotes  from  Lee's  tragedies  some  of  his  pas- 
sages of  this  sort  : 

"  The  sun,  too,  seems 
As  conscious  of  my  joy,  with  broader  eye 
To  look  abroad  the  world,  and  all  things  smile 
Like  Sophonisba." 

Noodle  replies  : 

"  This  day,  0  Mr.  Doodle,  is  a  day, 
Indeed  ! — A  day  we  never  saw  before. 
The  mighty  Thomas  Thumb  victorious  comes  \ 

"Note.— Dr.  B— y  reads.  The  mighty  Tall-mast  Thumb.  Mr.  D— s. 
The  mighty  Thumbing  Thumb.  Mr.  T — d  reads,  Thundering.  I  think 
Thomas  more  agreeable  to  the  great  simplicity  so  apparent  in  our  author." 

Scene  IL 
"  King.  Let  nothing  but  a  face  of  joy  appear ; 
The  man  who  frowns  this  day  shall  lose  his  head, 
That  he  may  have  no  face  to  frown  withal. 
Smile  DollalloUa — Ila  !  what  wrinkled  sorrow 
Hangs,  sits,  lies,  frowns  upon  thy  knitted  brow  ?" 

And  in  a  note  on  this  last  line  we  find  : 

"  Repentance /roji'w.'?  on  thy  contracted  brow." — Soph. 
"  Hung  on  his  clouded  brow,  I  mark'd  despair." — Ibid. 
"  A  sullen  gloom 
Scowls  on  his  brow." — Busiris. 

Here  again  is  a  parody  of  a  sufficiently  common  fault  of 
the  tragedians.  The  ghost  of  Tom  Thumb's  father  ap- 
pears to  King  Arthur,  and  says  : 

*'  Oh  !  then  prepare  to  hear — what  but  to  hear 
Is  full  enough  to  send  thy  spirit  hence. 


English  Literature.  325 

Thy  subjects  up  in  arms,  by  Grizzle  led, 
Will,  ere  the  rosy-fingered  morn  shall  ope 
The  shutters  of  the  sky,  before  the  gate 
Of  this  thy  royal  palace,  swarming  spread. 
So  have  I  seen  the  bees  in  clusters  swarm, 
So  have  I  seen  the  stars  in  frosty  nights. 
So  have  I  seen  the  sand  in  windy  days, 
So  have  I  seen  the  ghosts  on  Pluto's  shore, 
So  have  I  seen  the  flowers  in  spring  arise. 
So  have  I  seen  the  leaves  in  autumn  fall, 
So  have  I  seen  the  fruits  in  summer  smile, 
So  have  I  seen  the  snow  in  winter  frown. 

"  King.  Damn  all  thou  hast  seen  !  Dost  thou  beneath  the  shape 
Of  Gaffer  Thumb,  come  hither  to  abuse  me 
With  similes,  to  keep  me  on  the  rack  ? 
Hence — or  by  all  the  torments  of  thy  hell, 
I'll  run  thee  through  the  body,  though  thou'st  none. 

"  Ghost.  Arthur,  beware !  I  must  this  moment  hence, 
Not  frighted  by  your  voice,  but  by  the  cock's ! 
Arthur,  beware !  beware  !  beware  !  beware ! 
Strive  to  avert  thy  yet  impending  fate ; 
For  if  thou'rt  killed  to-day. 
To-morrow  all  thy  care  will  come  too  late." 

And  when  Noodle  comes  to  announce  that  Tom  Thumb 
has  been  swallowed  by  "  a  cow,  of  larger  than  the  usual 
size,"  he  enters  the  scene  with  these  words  : 

"  Oh  !  monstrous,  dreadful,  terrible,  oh  !  oh  ! 
Deaf  be  my  ears,  forever  blind  my  eyes  ! 
Dumb  be  my  tongue  !  feet  lame  !  all  senses  lost ! 
Howl,  wolves;  grunt,  bears  ;  hiss,  snakes  ;  shriek  all  ye  ghosts  ! 

"  Note. — These  beautiful  phrases  are  all  to  be  found  in  one  single 
speech  of  King  Arthur,  or  the  British  Worthy. 

"  Chrononhotonthologos,"  produced  in  1734,  is  another 
mock  tragedy,  by  Henry  Carey,  author  of  "  Sally  in  Our 
Alley."  This  "  most  Tragical  Tragedy  that  ever  Avas 
Tragedized  by  any  Company  of  Tragedians "  begins  in 
an  antechamber  of  the  palace,  where  Rigdum  Funidos 


326  English  Literature. 

learns  that  the  King  is  asleep.  The  King,  on  awakening, 
threatens  to  banish  Somnus  from  his  dominions.  There 
is  to  be  eternal  pantomime  to  keep  mankind  from  sleep. 
In  the  midst  of  the  pantomime  a  guard  cries  : 

"  To  arms !  to  arms  !  great  Chrouonhotoiithologos  ! 
Th'  antipodean  powers  from  realQis  below 
Have  burst  the  solid  entrails  of  the  earth  ; 
Gushing  such  cataracts  of  forces  forth 
The  world  is  too  incopious  to  contain  'em." 

Chrononhotonthologos  takes  the  King  of  the  Antipodes, 
who  walks  with  his  head  where  his  feet  should  be.  The 
King  is  invited  to  take  some  wine  in  the  tent  of  his  gen- 
eral, Bombardinion  ;  he  assents,  and  expresses  a  desire  for 
something  to  eat.     Bombardinion  to  the  cook  : 

"  See  that  the  table  constantly  be  spread 
With  all  that  Art  and  Nature  can  produce. 
Traverse  from  pole  to  pole ;  sail  round  the  globe  ; 
Bring  every  eatable  that  can  be  eat : 
The  king  shall  eat  tho'  all  mankind  be  starved." 

A  quarrel  arises.  The  King  kills  the  cook  and  strikes  his 
general  : 

"  Bomhardinion.  A  blow !     Shall  Bombardinion  take  a  blow  ? 
Blush,  blush,  thou  sun  !     Start  back  then  rapid  ocean  ! 
Hill,  vales,  seas,  mountains  !     All  commixing  crumble. 
And  into  Chaos  pulverize  the  world  ; 
For  Bombardinion  has  received  a  blow, 
And  Chrononhotonthologos  shall  die." 

And  he  kills  him.     A  physician  is  brought,  who  says  : 

"  My  lord,  he's  far  beyond  the  power  of  physic ; 
His  soul  has  left  his  body  and  this  world. 

"  Bombardinion.  Then  go  to  'tother  world  and  fetch  it  back. 
And  if  I  find  thou  triflest  with  me  there,  [A'?7&  hiui. 

I'll  chase  thy  shade  thro'  myriads  of  orbs, 
And  drive  thee  far  beyond  the  verge  of  nature. 


English  Literature.  327 

Ha!  call'st  thou,  Chrononhotonthologos? 

I  come  !  your  faithful  Bombaidiuion  comes  ! 

He  comes  in  worlds  unknown  to  make  new  wars, 

And  gain  thee  empires  num'rous  as  the  stars."  \_Kills  himself. 

These  two  pieces  were  the  destructive  part  of  the  new 
feeling,  and  this  found  further  expression  in  George  Lil- 
le's (1693-1739)  tragedy,  "The  London  Merchant,  or  the 
History  of  George  Barnwell,"  which  was  brought  out  in 
1731,  ten  years  before  Richardson's  "Pamela"  was  pub- 
lished. It  marks  in  the  history  of  the  stage  the  same 
change  which  Richardson  introduced  into  the  novel.  Yet 
the  comparison  must  not  be  carried  too  far  ;  they  agree 
in  the  most  devoted  respect  for  morality,  but  in  art  j^oor 
Lillo  is  the  merest  bungler,  and  by  the  side  of  Richardson 
he  makes  but  a  poor  show. 

The  play  itself  was  what  the  Germans  call  epoch-mak- 
ing ;  first,  because  it  was  written  in  prose,  and  secondly, 
because  of  the  plot,  which  was  taken  from  an  old  ballad,* 
that  "  of  '  George  Barnwell,'  an  apprentice  of  London,  who 
thrice  robbed  his  master,  and  murdered  his  uncle  in  Lud- 
low," thus  bringing  a  citizen  on  the  stage  as  hero.  The 
plot  is,  briefly,  the  story  of  the  young  apprentice,  who  gets 
into  bad  company,  and  to  stealing  money,  and  murder,  so 
that  the  last  scene  is  the  place  of  execution,  "  The  gal- 
lows and  ladders  at  the  further  end  of  the  stage."  To  us 
this  seems  a  sufficiently  common  plot,  yet,  at  the  time  it 

*  "A  Yorkshire  Tragedy"  (1608)  is  sometimes  mentioned  as  an  early 
play  with  the  modern  spirit,  but  it  must  be  remembered  that  it  was  written 
long  before  the  heroic  drama  existed.  Not  even  in  France  were  there 
rules  at  that  time.     It  was  a  dramatization  of  a  story  told  in  a  ballad. 

John  Home's  "Douglas"  (1756)  was  founded  on  the  ballad  of  "Gil 
Morrice."  The  play  keeps  close  to  the  unities.  Of  Lillo's  other  plays, 
"Fatal  Curiosity"  (1737)  observes  the  unities;  "Arden  of  Fevershara  " 
does  not. 


j-< 


English  Literature. 


was  produced,  the  fact  that  the  play  had  nothing  to  do 
with  kings  and  heroes  was  enough  to  make  it  the  object 
of  very  genuine  curiosity.  "  The  witlings,"  we  are  told, 
called  it  "  a  Newgate  Tragedy,"  and  even  proposed  to  re- 
ceive it  with  scorn,  but  they  were  overcome  by  its  pathos 
and  disarmed  of  their  ill-will.  The  prologue,  by  Mr.  Gib- 
ber, Jun.,  was  an  ingenious  petition  for  a  kind  hearing  : 

"  The  Tragic  Muse,  sublime,  deliglits  to  show 
Princes  distrust,  and  scenes  of  royal  woe ; 
In  awful  pomp,  majestic,  to  relate 
The  fall  of  nations,  or  some  hero's  fate. 

***** 
Upon  our  stage  indeed,  with  wish'd  success, 
You've  sometimes  seen  her  in  a  humbler  dress ; 
Great  only  in  distress.     When  she  complains 
In  Southern's,  Rowe's,  or  Otway's  moving  strains, 
The  brilliant  drops  that  fall  from  each  bright  eye, 
The  absent  pomp,  with  brighter  gems,  supply. 
Forgive  us  then,  if  we  attempt  to  show, 
In  artless  strains,  a  tale  of  private  woe. 
A  London  'Prentice  ruined  is  our  theme, 
Drawn  from  the  fam'd  old  song  that  bears  his  name. 
We  hope  your  taste  is  not  so  high  to  scorn 
A  moral  tale,  esteem'd  e'er  you  were  born. 

***** 
Though  art  be  wanting,  and  our  numbers  fail. 
Indulge  the  attempt  in  justice  to  the  tale." 

Fully  to  understand  the  importance  of  this  play  in 
the  history  of  literature,  we  must  recall  the  extremely 
artificial  nature  of  the  heroic  drama,  with  its  unities,  and 
the  necessity  that  was  imposed  on  it  of  concerning  itself 
only  with  princes  and  heroes.*     We  have  seen  how  the 

*  As  Kuno  Fischer  has  well  condensed  it,  the  stage  had  modelled  itself 
on  society  with  its  rigid  distinctions  of  rank.  Princes  and  heroes  belonged 
to  tragedy ;  the  middle  class  to  comedy,  peasants  to  the  pastorals.  See 
his  "  Leasing  als  Reformator  der  deutschen  Sprache  "  (Stuttgart :  Cotta, 
p.  73). 


Engluh  Literature.  329 

dramatists  groaned  under  their  self-imposed  chains,  how 
Corneille  entreated  in  vain  for  thirty  hours,  and  sug- 
gested that  it  was  possible  to  take  an  interest  in  the  fate 
of  common  people.  What  Corneille  had  said  in  1651 
Lillo  repeats  in  the  prefatory  letter  to  this  play  :  "  If 
Princes,  &c.,  were  alone  liable  to  misfortunes,  arising  from 
vice,  or  weakness  in  themselves,  or  others,  there  would  be 
good  reason  for  confining  the  characters  in  tragedy  to 
those  of  superior  rank  ;  but,  since  the  contrary  is  evident, 
nothing  can  be  more  reasonable  than  to  proportion  the 
remedy  to  the  disease.  I  am  far  from  denying  that  trage- 
dies, founded  on  any  instructive  and  extraordinary  events 
in  History,  or  well-invented  Fable,  when  the  persons  intro- 
duced are  of  the  highest  rank,  are  without  their  use,  even 
to  the  bulk  of  their  audience.  ...  I  have  attempted,  in- 
deed, to  enlarge  the  province  of  the  graver  kind  of  poe- 
try, and  should  be  glad  to  see  it  carried  on  by  some  abler 
hand." 

Still,  the  success  of  the  play  settled  the  question  whether 
or  not  the  novelty  was  justifiable,  although  it,  of  course, 
did  not  put  an  end  to  all  cavilling.  One  of  the  comments 
upon  it,  in  the  old  edition,  is  ascribed  to  a  "  Living  Au- 
thoress," who  says,  with  a  certain  scorn,  "  Mr.  Lillo  being 
a  tradesman,  was  perhaps  thereby  influenced  to  describe 
scenes  in  humble  life  ;  beyond  which  his  knowledge  could 
only  exist  in  theory" — although  it  would  be  fair  to  ask  how 
much  the  ordinary  writers  of  tragedies  knew  of  Eastern 
emperors,  and  whether  the  heroic  plays  were  bits  of  heroic 
autobiography.  "...  Though  not  founded  on  the  dis- 
tresses of  the  great,  yet  Colly  Cibber  eagerly  received  this 
Pathetic  Drama,  which  was  soon  patronized  by  the  Mer- 
cantile Interest,  and  after  its  first  run  of  twenty  successive 
nights  in  the  summer,  was  also  frequently  represented  to 
crowded  houses  during  the  following  winter. 


330  English  Literal icre. 

"  Mr.  Pope  allowed  that  the  Fable  was  well  conducted  ; 
the  Language  natural,  and  if  sometimes  elevated  above 
the  simplicity  of  the  characters,  yet  it  never  was  mean, 
nor  deviated  from  jDropriety  of  style  calculated  to  affect 
the  heart." 

Yet  it  is  a  most  wretched  play  ;  to  the  last  degree 
stilted,  with  a  sort  of  melodramatic  tremolo  running 
through  it.*  For  instance,  take  the  speech  of  Mr.  Thorow- 
good,  in  answer  to  the  good  Mr.  Trueman,  who  has  re- 
marked that,  according  to  his  observation, 

"those  countries,  where  trade  is  promoted  and  encouraged,  do  not  make 
discoveries  to  destroy,  but  to  improve  manlvind,  by  love  and  friendship ; 
to  tame  the  fierce  and  polish  the  most  savage,"  etc. 

'•'•  Thorowgood.  'Tis  justly  observed :  the  populous  east,  luxuriant,  abounds 
with  glittering  gems,  bright  pearls,  aromatick  spices,  and  health-restoring 
drugs :  The  late-found  western  world  glows  with  unnumbered  veins  of 
gold  and  silver  ore.  On  every  climate  and  on  every  country,  heaven  has 
bestowed  some  good  peculiar  to  itself.  It  is  the  industrious  merchant's 
business  to  collect  the  various  blessings  of  each  soil  and  climate,  to  enrich 
his  native  country. — Well !  I  have  examined  your  accounts  :  they  are  not 
only  just,  as  I  have  always  found  them,  but  regularly  kept,  and  fairly 
entered.  I  commend  your  diligence.  Method  in  business  is  the  surest 
guide.  He  who  neglects  it,  frequently  stumbles,  and  always  wanders  per- 
plexed, uncertain,  and  in  danger.  Are  Barnwell's  accounts  ready  for  my 
inspection  ;  he  does  not  use  to  be  the  last  on  these  occasions." 

Or  this,  when  Barnwell  is  about  to  murder  his  uncle  : 
"  Murder  my  uncle  1    Yonder  limpid  stream,  whose  hoary  fall  has  made  a 

*  His  prose,  which  is,  rather,  a  tremulous  blank  verse,  resembles  some 
that  we  find  in  Drydcn's  plays,  and,  indeed,  held  its  ground  down  to  an 
undetermined  period  in  this  century.  Dryden,  for  instance,  has  ("  Am- 
boyna,"  iii.  1):  "Dead  with  grief;  with  these  two  hands  I  scratch'd  him 
out  a  grave ;  on  which  I  placed  a  cross,  and  every  day  wept  o'er  the 
ground  where  all  my  Joys  lay  bury'd.  The  manner  of  my  Life  who  can 
express !  The  Fountain  Water  was  my  only  Drink,  the  crabbed  Juice  and 
Rind  of  half-ripe  Lemmons  my  only  Food,  except  some  Roots  ;  my  House 
the  widow'd  Cave  of  some  wild  Beast,"  etc. 


English  Literature.  331 

natural  cascade,  as  I  pass'd  by,  in  doleful  accents  secm'd  to  muriniir, 
murder.  The  earth,  the  air,  and  water,  seem'd  concerned ;  but  that's  not 
strange,"  etc. 

Then  the  uncle  appears,  his  imagination  "fill'd  with 
ghastly  forms  of  dreary  graves,  and  bodies  changed  by 

death,"  etc. 

"  [^Enter  George  Barnwell  at  a  distance.] 

"  0  death,  thou  strange  mysterious  power,  seen  every  day,  yet  never 
understood,  but  by  the  uncommunicative  dead,  what  art  thou?"  etc. 

When  he  gets  to  the  end  of  his  sentence,  Barnwell 
rushes  forward  and  stabs  him  ;  he  falls  wishing  bless- 
ings on 

"  My  dearest  nephew  ;  forgive  my  murderer,  and  take  my  fleeting  soul  to 
endless  mercy."  * 

'^Barnwell.  Expiring  saint!     0  murder'd,  martyr'd  uncle!"  etc. 

The  heroic  language  survived  in  the  following  passages, 
and  doubtless  helped  to  redeem  the  play  in  the  eyes  of  its 
critics  : 

"  Maria.  Why  are  your  streaming  eyes  still  fixed  below,  as  though 
thou'dst  give  the  greedy  earth  thy  sorrows,  and  rob  me  of  my  due  ?  Were 
happiness  within  your  power,  you  should  bestow  it  where  you  pleased ; 
but  in  your  misery  I  must  and  will  partake. 

"  Barnwell.  Oh !  say  not  so,  but  fly,  abhor,  and  leave  me  to  my  fate.  Con- 
sider what  you  are :  how  vast  your  fortune,  and  how  bright  your  fame : 
have  pity  on  your  youth,  your  beauty,  and  unequalled  virtue,  for  which  so 
many  noble  peers  have  sighed  in  vain.  Bless  with  your  charms  some 
honourable  lord.  Adorn  with  your  beauty,  and  by  your  example  improve, 
the  English  court,  that  justly  claims  your  merit ;  and  so  shall  I  quickly  be 
to  you  as  though  I  had  never  been. 

"  Barnwell.     Ere  I  knew  guilt  or  shame,  when  fortune  smiled,  and  when 

*  In  the  ballad,  this  incident  is  more  curtly  narrated  : 
"  Sudden  within  a  wood, 

He  struck  his  uncle  down, 
And  beat  his  brains  out  of  his  head ; 
So  sore  he  crackt  his  crown." — Percy's  "  Reliques." 


00- 


Engl  ish  L  iter  at  are. 


my  youthful  hopes  were  at  the  highest ;  if  then  to  have  raised  my  thoughts 
to  you,  had  been  presumption  in  me  never  to  have  been  pardoned,  think 
how  much  beneath  yourself  you  condescend  to  regard  me  now. 

^'^  Maria.  Let  her  blush  who,  professing  love,  invades  the  freedom  of 
your  sex's  choice,  and  meanly  sues  in  hopes  of  a  return.  Your  inevitable 
fate  hath  rendered  hope  impossible  as  vain.  Then  why  should  I  fear  to 
avow  a  passion  so  just  and  so  disinterested  ? 

******** 

^^  Barnwell.  So  the  aromatic  spices  of  the  East,  which  all  the  living  covet 
and  esteem,  are  with  unavailing  kindness  wasted  on  the  dead." 

It  will  be  seen  that  a  thrifty  tradesman  was  lost  in  George 
Barnwell.  The  earnest  moral  aim  of  the  play  fell  in  with 
the  popular  spirit,  but  its  main  importance  was  that  it  in- 
troduced a  hero  from  private  life.*  Otway,  to  be  sure,  had 
done  this,  for  no  man  is  ever  the  first  to  do  anything,  but 
Lillo  went  lower,  and  selected  an  apprentice  of  London, 
who  is  a  much  less  romantic  person  than  a  Venetian  con- 
spirator. The  moral  tendency  had  been  shown  by  South- 
ern, Rowe,  and  Addison — the  same  moral  tendency  that 
inspired  the  Spectator ;  Lillo  not  only  enforced  that,  but 
he  opened  the  stage  to  contemporary  interests.  Lillo 
continued  in  the  same  path  which  he  had  had  the  good 
fortune  to  open  ;  he  wrote  his  "  Fatal  Curiosity,"  which 
Fielding  brought  out  in  1736,  writing  a  prologue  for  it 
which  contained  these  lines  : 

"No  fustian  hero  rages  here  to-night; 
No  armies  fall  to  fix  a  tyrant's  right : 
■ —f 

*  In  his  "  Reflexions  Historiques  ct  Litteraires  sur  les  Differents  Theatres 
de  I'Europe"  (Amsterdam,  1740),  p.  132,  Riecoboni  mourns  the  defection 
of  the  English  from  what  he  calls  the  reform  of  the  stage  which  Ad- 
dison's "Cato"  had  so  well  begun:  "On  s'etait  imagine  que  cette 
trngedie  en  avait  donne  la  loi  au  Theatre  Anglois,  mais  les  tragedies 
nouvelles,  que  I'on  a  donnees  depuis  dans  leur  ancien  gout,  et  particu- 
liferement  una  des  dernieres  qui  a  pour  titre  '  Georges  Barnevelt,'  et 
que  a  eu  un  si  grand  succes  ne  nous  font  pas  presumer  qu'ils  puissent 
jamais  changer." 


English  Literature.  2)2)3 

From  lower  life  we  draw  our  scene's  distress, 
Let  not  your  equals  move  your  pity  less." 

Edward  Moore,  in  1753,  brought  out  the  "  Gamester  ;" 
and  Cumberland  wrote  a  number  of  plays  continuing  the 
reaction  against  the  French  dramatic  rules.  The  influence 
of  Lillo's  reform  was  felt  in  England  less  than  in  France 
and  Germany,  because  in  England,  as  we  have  seen,  the 
French  rules  were  less  revered  than  on  the  continent. 
We  have  seen  how  little  the  unities  were  regarded  by  the 
English  writers,  and  teaching  morality  by  the  plays  cer- 
tainly does  not  improve  the  stage.  The  novel  absorbed 
more  general  interest,  and  the  theatre  languished. 

In  France,  this  new  step  found  many  admirers  and  im- 
itators, the  most  important  of  whom  was  Diderot,  who 
(vii.  95)  compared  the  scene  between  Maria  and  Barnwell 
in  prison  with  the  "  Philoctetes"  of  Sophocles,  as  the  hero 
is  heard  shrieking, and  also  translated  Moore's  "Gamester." 
Diderot's  own  plays  were  written  in  direct  opposition  to 
the  classical  views  of  his  time,  but  they  were  not  success- 
ful. "  The  Natural  Son,"  taken,  without  acknowledg- 
ment, from  Goldoni's  "  A  True  Friend,"  is  certainly  as 
vapid  a  play  as  ever  was  written,  and  was  a  complete  fail- 
ure on  the  stage  (written  1757,  brought  out  1771).  "The 
Father  of  the  Family"  (written  1758,  acted  1761)  is  bet- 
ter, and  was,  at  least  in  Germany  and  Italy,  popular.  But, 
as  Mme.  de  Stael  said,  "  Diderot,  in  his  plays,  put  the 
affectation  of  nature  in  the  place  of  the  affectation  of 
convention."  It  was  not  so  much  Diderot's  own  plays  as 
what  he  wrote  about  acting  that  aided  the  revolution  in 
taste  which,  in  his  way,  Lillo  had  begun.  To  be  sure, 
Diderot  very  strongly  urged  that  plays  should  directly 
inculcate  morality,  forgetting,  as  Mr.  Morley  says  ("  Did- 
erot," 215),  that  "  exhortation  in  set  speeches  always  has 
been,  and   always   will  bo,  the   feeblest   bulwark    against 


334  English  Literature. 

the  boiling  floods  of  passion  that  helpless  virtue  ever  in- 
vented, and  it  matters  not  at  all  whether  the  hortatory- 
speeches  are  placed  on  the  lips  of  Mr.  Talkative,  the  son 
of  Saywell,  or  of  some  tearful  dummy  labelled  the  Father 
of  the  Famil)'."  In  other  respects  he  was  wiser  ;  his  rule 
was,  "  Watch  nature,  follow  her  simple  and  spontaneous 
guiding,"  and  he  enforced  this  in  many  ways,  in  con- 
demning the  French  classic  drama.  "  The  dialogue,"  he 
said,  "  is  all  emphasis,  wit,  and  glitter ;  all  a  thousand 
leagues  away  from  nature.  Instead  of  artificially  giving 
to  their  characters  esjivlt  at  every  point,  poets  ought  to 
place  them  in  such  situations  as  will  give  it  to  them. 
Where  in  the  world  did  men  and  women  ever  speak  as 
we  declaim  ?  Why  should  princes  and  kings  walk  differ- 
ently from  any  man  Avho  walks  well  ?  Did  they  then 
gesticulate  like  raving  madmen?  Do  princesses  Avhen 
they  speak  utter  sharp  hissings  ?"  ("  Bijoux  Indiscrets," 
ch.  xxxviii.)  It  was  in  the  criticism  of  details  that  he  was 
wisest  and  that  his  influence  was  most  widely  felt.*  One 
reason  was  that  the  great  romantic  revival  was  to  draw 
its  life  from  the  Dark  Ages,  which  Diderot  f  hated,  as  did 

*  He  said  (Morley's  "  Diderot,"  p.  226)  that,  first,  a  domestic  or  bourgeois 
tragedy  must  be  created;  secondly,  the  conditions  of  men,  their  callings 
and  situations,  the  types  of  classes,  in  short,  must  be  substituted  for  mere 
individual  characters ;  thirdly,  a  real  tragedy  must  be  introduced  upon  the 
lyric  theatre ;  and  that,  finally,  the  dance  must  be  brought  within  the  forms 
of  a  true  poem. 

Diderot  wrote  plays  that  brought  into  literature  the  sufferings  of  the 
middle  classes,  as  they  then  began  to  be  put  upon  canvas  by  Greuze. 
This  connection  between  painting  and  literature  may  be  often  seen.  The 
Dutch  painters  were  much  admired,  for  instance,  in  England  and  Spain. 
Louis  XIV.  could  not  tolerate  them.  A  full  exposition  of  the  analogy  be- 
tween the  two  arts  would  take  up  too  much  space. 

t  It  would  not  Ijc  exact  to  say  that  all  the  influence  which  moved  Diderot 
in  this  direction  came  from  Lillo  alone.     Destouches  (1680-1754)  in  his 


Enylish  Literature.  335 

all  the  Encyclopsedists.  He,  however,  broke  open  the 
road  which  literature  was  about  to  follow. 

Diderot's  influence  on  Lessing  was  very  great,  and  this 
showed  itself  not  only  in  the  German's  onslaught  on  the 
so-called  tragedy,  which  is  a  model  of  literary  criticism, 
but  also  in  his  creative  work,  where  he  closely  copied  the 
English  models,  and  with  more  ability  than  was  shown  by 
Diderot,  who  was  a  critic  above  all  things.  We  left  the 
German  stage,  when  we  last  spoke  of  it,  in  the  care  of 
Gottsched,  who  had  brought  out  his  play,  "  Der  sterbende 
Cato  "  (1732),  modelling  himself  on  Addison's  play,  doubt- 
less with  special  delight  that  he  could  appeal  to  Addi- 
son's example  ;  for,  as  we  saw,  his  opponents,  Bodmer  es- 
pecially, made  great  use  of  Addison's  defence  of  Milton 
in  their  attack  on  the  French  school.  If  the  literature  of 
this  period  was  everywhere  artificial,  an  invention  of  the 
cultivated  classes,  nowhere  was  this  more  the  case  than 
in  Germany,     There  the  divorce  between  the  aristocracy 

"  Glorieux,"  and  La  Cliaussee  (1692-1754),  preceded  him  in  this  movement. 
Riccoboni  wrote  of  the  latter :  "  La  Chaussee  a  invente  un  nouveau  genre 
de  comedie;  elle  avait  toujours  represente  les  incidents  domestiques  des 
bourgeois,  des  gens  aises  et  quelquefois  meme  des  artisans.  II  y  a  cepen- 
dant  dans  la  societe  une  espece  de  personnages  qui  sent  exclus  d'une  ac- 
tion comique;  on  croit  les  gentilshommes  et  les  grands  seigneurs  d'une 
haute  naissance,  trop  eieves  pour  entrer  dans  les  situations  domestiques 
qui  ont  toujours  ete  le  partage  de  la  comedie;  ils  ne  peuvent  pas  nonr 
plus  agir  dans  le  tragique,  parce  qu'ils  ne  sont  pas  assez  grands  pour 
cliausser  le  cotliurne,  que  n'appartient  qu'i  des  princes  et  a  des  actions 
heroiques.  Ce  sont  ces  memes  personnes,  qui  occupent,  si  I'on  peut  se 
servii-  de  ce  terme,  une  espece  de  niche  isolee  et  un  certain  milieu  entrc  le 
rang  e'leve  de  la  tragedie  et  le  populaire  de  la  comedie,  que  M.  de  la 
Chaussee  a  imagine  de  faire  entrer  dans  une  action,  qui  puisse  avoir  tantot 
riiiieressant  de  la  tragedie  et  tantot  les  situations  de  la  vie  civile  entre 
des  gens  de  condition,  et  qui  conserve  aussi  le  caractere  de  la  come  lie  " 
(Lettre  a  Muratori). 

But  it  is  to  be  noticed  that  La  ChausFeo  kept  to  the  unities ! 


336  EnylUIi  Literature. 

and  the  people  was  complete ;  the  language  even  was 
neglected,  and  French  became  the  common  medium  of 
communication,  with  which  all  the  writers  were  familiar 
and  many  used  exclusively.  But  the  seed  which  Bodmer 
sowed  bore  good  fruit,  and  the  nation  turned  gradually 
away  from  France  and  learned  to  read  and  study  English 
writers.  This  tendency  prevailed  throughout  the  last 
century.  We  see  it  referred  to  in  Goethe's  autobiogra- 
phy, and  in  old  libraries  we  find  a  number  of  German 
reprints  of  English  books,  such  as  Goldsmith  and  Ossian, 
and  countless  translations  of  popular  writers.  \Ye  find 
mention,  too,  of  occasional  translations  of  single  plays  of 
Shakspere.  "Julius  Caesar"  was  put  into  German  in  1741, 
but  into  Alexandrines,  however.  Lessing,  who  was  born 
in  1729,  welcomed  the  new  movement,  and  wrote  his  "  Miss 
Sara  Sampson"  (1755),  the  very  name  of  which  indicates 
its  pedigree.  This  play  belongs  to  the  same  school  with 
"George  Barnwell"  and  the  "Gamester;"  it  is  what  the 
Germans  call  a  "  biirgerliches  Ti-auerspiel."  One  of  his 
friends,  Ramler,  wrote  to  Gleim,  "  The  audience  sat  for 
four  hours  like  statues,  and  dissolved  in  tears."* 
/  Here  the  tearfulness  of  the  last  century  may  be  said  to 
begin.  Indeed,  these  plays  were  called  la  comedie  larmo- 
yante  as  well  as  bourgeoise,  and  the  sentimentality  Avhich 
appeared  in  them  and  novels  was  one  of  the  early  reac- 
tions against  the  omnipotence  of  reason. f     Judging  from 

*  Schroder,  later  known  as  the  actor  of  Shakspere,  and  who  held  in 
Germany  much  the  same  place  as  Garrick  in  England,  was  then  but  ten 
years  old,  and  played  the  little  girl,  Arabella. 

t  Compare  the  French  enthusiasm  over  Rousseau.  Thus,  Taine,"  L'Ancien 
Regime,"  p.  210  :  "  On  batit  dans  son  pare  un  petit  temple  a  I'Amitie.  On 
dresse  dans  son  cabinet  un  petit  temple  au  Bienfaisance.  On  porte  des 
robes  a  la  J.  J.  Rousseau  '  analogues  aux  principes  de  cet  auteur.'  On 
choisit  pour  coiffure  '  des  poufs  au  sentiment,'  dans  lesqucls  on  place  le 
portrait  de  sa  fiile,  lic  sa  mere,  do  ?on  serin,  de  son  chion,  tout  cela  garni 


Engluh  Literature.  337 

their  literature,  our  ancestors  in  the  last  century  v>'hen  they 
were  alone  brooded  over  the  terrors  of  the  grave  ;  when 
they  were  in  the  company  of  their  kind,  they  wept  pro- 
fusely. At  any  rate,  those  Germans  who  wept  over  "  Miss 
Sara  Sampson  "  had  soon  a  chance  to  weep  again,  for 
"  George  Barnwell "  was  a  few  days  later  acted  by  the 
same  troupe  (Stahr,  i.  145).  Of  Diderot's  further  influ- 
ence on  Lessing — which  the  German  critic  cheerfully  ac- 
knowledged— and  of  "Minna  von  Barnhelm,"  etc.,  there 
is  no  need  of  speaking  here.  It  is  only  necessary  to  say 
that  in  the  "Emilia  Galotti"  Lessing  took  a  step  further 
Ijy  placing  the  sanctity  of  the  family  in  direct  opposition 
to  the  caprice  of  a  prince  (as  did  Schiller  in  his  "  Kabale 
und  Liebe"),  and  that  he  lifted  up  the  whole  drama  by 
precept  as  well  as  example  when  he  showed  the  Germans 
how  great  a  genius  was  Shakspere.  He  did  this,  too,  with- 
out injustice  to  the  French  tragedians. 

In  England,  however,  there  was  no  resuscitation  of  the 
drama,  but  the  novel  flourished  as  it  had  not  done  before, 
and  we  must  return  to  Richardson  to  see  the  full  nature 
of  this  change.  It  would  be  easy  to  turn  Richardson  to 
ridicule.  The  enormous  length  of  his  novels  may  seem 
absurd  to  us,  but  this  must  have  been  a  great  charm  in 
the  days  when  amusing  literature  was  in  its  infancy.  We 
have  seen  the  strong  moral  tendency  in  the  writers  of  this 
age,  and  although  Pamela  taught  the  practical  lesson  that 


des  cheveus  de  son  p^re  ou  d'un  ami  de  coeur.  .  .  .  Toutes  les  fois  que  des 
amies  se  disent  des  choses  sensibles,  elles  doivent  subitemeut  prendre  une 
petite  voix  claire  et  trainante,  se  regarder  tendrement  en  penchant  la  tete, 
et  s'embrasser  souvent." 

See  also  Erich  Schmidt's  "  Richardson,  Rousseau  und  Goethe,"  p.  190; 
Goncourt's  "  La  Femme  au  XVIIP  Si^cle,"  p.  380 ;  Morley's  "  Rousseau," 
ii.  31.  Compare  Miss  Austen's  "  Sense  and  Sensibility."  See,  too,  "A 
Study  of  Sensibility  "  in  the  Fortnightly  for  September,  1882. 

15 


338  English  Literature. 

virtue  secured  position  in  this  world  as  well  as  in  the  next, 
Richardson  in  "  Clarissa  Harlowe  "  drew  a  picture  of  real, 
indomitable  virtue.  "  Pamela  "  was  enormously  admired 
at  the  time.  As  Mr.  Morley  says  ("  Diderot,"  p.  256), 
"  All  England  went  mad  with  enthusiasm  over  the  trials, 
the  virtue,  the  triumph  of  a  rustic  ladies'  maid,"  and  he 
points  out  that  this  novel  marked  a  social  as  well  as  a 
literary  transition.  The  people,  we  see,  were  beginning 
to  lift  up  their  heads  and  to  assert  themselves.  In  France, 
the  enthusiasm  was  no  less  intense.  Voltaire,  although 
he  really  introduced  English  literature  to  the  French,  it 
is  true,  did  not  feel  it  ;  but  Voltaire  was  above  all  thhigs 
a-  member  of  the  literary  class,  and  that  class  is  generally 
very  far  removed  from  possessing  keen  sympathy  with 
the  people,  who  are  sure  to  introduce  an  element  that 
needs  refining  ;  they  prefer  to  refine  what  they  already 
have.  Moreover,  Voltaire's  intellectiial  zeal  made  him  de- 
test the  Church  as  a  relic  of  barbarism,  of  the  Middle  Ages, 
of  popular  superstition  :  he,  in  fact,  never  cared  to  intro- 
duce the  barbarism  which  would  follow  social  reform. 
What  he  said  about  "  Clarissa  Harlowe"  was  this  :  "It  is 
cruel  for  a  man  like  me  to  read  nine  whole  volumes  in 
which  you  find  nothing  at  all.  I  said — even  if  all  these 
people  were  my  relations  and  friends,  I  could  take  no  in- 
terest in  them.  I  can  see  nothing  in  the  writer  but  a 
clever  man  who  knows  the  curiosity  of  the  human  race, 
and  is  always  promising  something  from  volume  to  vol- 
ume, in  order  to  go  on  selling  them." 

In  his  "  Lettre  a  d'Alembert  sur  Ics  Spectacles,"  Rich- 
ardson praises  "Pamela,"  and  makes  admiring  mention  of 
"  George  Barnwell,"  which  appeared  in  a  French  transla- 
tion at  Paris,  in  1751.  In  a  note,  he  says  that  no  novel  had 
ever  appeared  in  any  language  which  came  near  "  Clarissa." 

Diderot  set  no  bounds  to  his  praise  in  his  celebrated 


English  Literature.  339 

eulogy  on  Richardson  :  "  O  Richardson,  Richardson, 
unique  among  men  in  my  eyes,  thou  shalt  be  my  favorite 
all  my  life  long  !  If  I  am  hard  driven  by  pressing  need, 
if  my  friend  is  overtaken  by  want,  if  the  mediocrity  of 
my  fortune  is  not  enough  to  give  my  children  what  is 
necessary  for  their  education,  I  will  sell  my  books  ;  but 
thou  shalt  remain  to  me,  thou  shalt  remain  on  the  same 
shelf  with  Moses,  Homer,  Euripides,  Sophocles  ! 

"O  Richardson,  I  make  bold  to  say  that  the  truest  his- 
tory is  full  of  falsehoods,  and  that  your  romance  is  full  of 
truths.  History  paints  a  few  individuals  ;  you  paint  the 
human  race.  History  sets  down  to  its  few  individuals 
what  they  have  neither  said  nor  done  ;  whatever  you  have 
set  down  to  man,  he  has  both  said  and  done.  .  .  .  No  ;  I 
say  that  history  is  often  a  bad  novel ;  and  the  novel  as 
you  have  handled  it,  is  good  history.  O  painter  of  nature, 
it  is  you  that  are  never  false. 

"  You  accuse  Richardson  of  being  long  !  .  .  .  Think  of 
the  details  what  you  please,  but  for  me  they  will  be  full 
of  interest  if  they  are  only  true,  if  they  bring  out  the 
passions,  if  they  display  character.  They  are  common, 
yon  say  ;  it  is  all  what  one  sees  every  day.  You  are  mis- 
taken ;  'tis  what  passes  every  day  before  your  eyes,  and 
what  you  never  see." 

Dr.  Johnson's  criticism  is  worthy  of  note  :  "  Why,  sir, 
if  you  were  to  read  Richardson  for  the  story,  your  im- 
patience would  be  so  much  frighted  that  you  would  hang 
yourself.  But  you  must  read  him  for  the  sentiment,  and 
consider  the  story  only  as  giving  occasion  to  the  senti- 
ment." Nowadays,  however,  instead  of  laying  violent 
hands  upon  ourselves,  we  lay  them  on  the  book,  cutting 
out  the  useless  matter,*  and  reading  Richardson,  if  we 

*  An  abridgment  appeared  in  Philadelphia  in  1*798. 


340  English  Literature. 

read  him  at  all,  only  in  an  abridgment.  "What  he  espe- 
cially lacks  is  the  power  of  delineating  great  passion  ;  he 
has  the  keenest  eye  in  the  world  for  sentiment  and  all  the 
machinery  of  social  life,  and  in  the  "Clarissa"  has  accom- 
plished the  task  of  drawing  a  great  tragedy  by  the  ac- 
cumulation of  details,  but  his  Lovelace  is  as  impossibly 
full  of  vices  as  his  "  Sir  Charles  Grandison "  (did  the 
name  have  only  an  accidental  resemblance  to  Addison  ?) 
is  of  virtues.  The  fact  is  that  the  aim  of  teaching  morality 
by  direct  exhortation  is  as  destructive  to  novels  and  plays 
as  works  of  art  as  it  is  to  music,  sculpture,  or  painting. 
Society  is  justified  in  demanding  that  lessons  of  wicked- 
ness should  not  be  inculcated,  but  it  will  in  time  leave 
lessons  of  goodness  unread,  though  it  may  express  the 
warmest  approval  of  them.  There  is  Sir  Charles  Gran- 
dison, for  example,  who  was  described  as  a  model  man 
after  Richardson  had  learned  with  horror  that  some  peo- 
ple had  been  so  far  misled  as  to  admire  the  vicious  Love- 
lace. His  goodness  is  inexhaustible,  and  it  is  much  to 
Richardson's  credit  that,  after  all,  we  do  not  hate  this 
"  faultless  monster  whom  the  world  ne'er  saw,"  even  after 
reading  the  description  of  his  virtues  and  their  effects. 
To  start  with,  he  is  young,  twenty  six  or  seven  years 
old — although  in  the  popular  imagination  of  the  present 
time  he  is  eternally  about  fifty -two,  or  just  twice  his 
real  age — rich,  handsome  :  "  In  his  aspect,"  writes  Miss 
Byron,  "  there  is  something  great  and  noble  that  shows 
him  to  be  of  rank.  Were  kings  to  be  chosen  for  beauty 
and  majesty  of  person,  Sir  Charles  Grandison  would  have 
few  competitors.  I  cannot  quote  the  whole  description 
of  his  charms  ;  I  will  turn  to  the  contemplation  of  a  few 
of  his  moral  qualities,  and  what  are  closely  connected 
\vith  them,  his  personal  habits.  He  dresses  to  the  fash- 
ion, rather  richly,  'tis  true,  than  gaudily  ;  but  still  I'ichly  : 


English  Literature.  341 

BO  that  he  gives  his  fine  person  its  full  consideration.  .  .  . 
His  equipage  is  perfectly  in  taste,  though  not  so  much 
to  the  glare  of  taste,  as  if  he  aimed  either  to  inspire 
or  shew  emulation.  He  seldom  travels  without  a  set,  and 
suitable  attendants  ;  and,  which  I  think  seems  a  little  to 
savour  of  singularity,  his  horses  are  not  docked  ;  their 
tails  are  only  tied  up  when  they  are  on  the  road.  This  I 
took  notice  of  when  we  came  to  town.  I  want,  methinks, 
my  dear,  to  find  some  fault  in  his  outward  appearance, 
were  it  but  to  make  you  think  me  impartial ;  my  grati- 
tude to  him,  and  my  veneration  for  him  notwithstanding. 
But  if  he  be  of  opinion  that  the  tails  of  these  noble 
animals  are  not  only  a  natural  ornament,  but  are  of  real 
use  to  defend  them  from  the  vexatious  insects  that  in 
summer  are  so  apt  to  annoy  them  (as  Jenny  has  just  now 
told  me  was  thought  to  be  his  reason  for  not  depriving 
his  cattle  of  a  defence,  which  nature  gave  them),  how  far 
from  a  dispraise  is  this  human  consideration  !"  etc.  And 
this  is  as  near  criticism  of  the  good  Sir  Charles  as  any- 
thing in  the  book.  Miss  Byron,  who  is  in  womanly  charm 
all  that  he  is  in  manliness,  to  be  sure,  does  most  of  the 
writing  about  him,  and  her  feelings  when  he  is  concerned 
are  very  much  inclined  in  his  favor.  She  is  not  alone  in 
this.  Sir  Charles  is  already  half  engaged  to  an  Italian 
lady,  Clementina,  w^ho  is  only  Avithheld  by  religious  scruples 
from  marrying  him.  He  holds  a  position  in  the  novel  very 
much  like  that  which  General  Washington  holds  in  the 
minds  of  good  Americans  who  form  their  opinion  of  the 
father  of  their  country  from  orations  and  postage-stamps. 
He  is  placid,  able,  gentlemanly,  and  very  statuesque.  He 
is  willing  to  marry  Clementina,  if  fate  commands,  though 
he  is  in  love  with  Harriet,  and  we  feel  tolerably  certain 
that  he  w^ill  not  languish  with  a  broken  heart  whatever 
happens.    Why  should  he  indeed  ?    Consolation  was  more 


342  Kngllsh  Literature. 

than  abundant :  he  has  a  ward,  Emily,  of  whom  Miss 
Byron  writes  (letter  Ixxxvi.),  "I  Avish  my  godfather  had 
not  put  it  in  my  head  that  Emily  is  cherishing  (perhaps 
unknown  to  herself)  a  flame  that  will  devour  her  peace. 
For,  to  be  sure,  this  young  creature  can  have  no  hope  that 
— yet  £50,000  is  a  vast  fortune. — But  it  can  never  buy  her 
guardian.  Do  you  think  such  a  man  as  Sir  Charles  Grandi- 
son  has  a  price  ? — I  am  sure  he  has  not."  It  is  needless 
to  say  that  Sir  Charles  was  proof  against  this  new  temp- 
tation. He  had  a  snug  fortune  of  his  own.  Then  there 
was  Lady  Olivia,  who  pursued  him  to  England — in  vain. 
A  man  who  is  the  object  of  so  much  admiration  on  the 
part  of  women  is  generally  sure  to  be  detested  by  men, 
but  Sir  Charles  escapes  this  sad  fate.  Although  he  is  al- 
ways correcting  the  faults  of  the  Avicked,  he  does  this  with 
so  much  tact  that  they  cannot  withhold  their  respect  for 
him.  He  especially  opposed  duelling.  And  when  he  had 
rescued  Miss  Byi*on  from  the  hands  of  her  abductor,  this 
villain  wished  to  get  satisfaction  from  Sir  Charles,  but 
there  Avas  no  persuading  him  to  fight.  Not  that  he  was  a 
coward — far  from  it ;  he  had  conscientious  objections  to 
the  practice.  He  talks  so  reasonably  that  he  couA'erts  his 
opponents  to  his  views,  Avhich  he  expounds  at  some  length, 
to  tlie  admiration  of  his  hearers.  "  '  The  devil  take  me,  Sir 
Hargrave,'  "  says  one,  "  '  if  you  shall  not  make  uj)  matters 
with  such  a  noble  adversary.' "  The  other  says:  "  '  He  has 
won  me  to  his  side.  ...  I  had  rather  have  Sir  Charles 
Grandison  for  my  friend  than  the  greatest  prince  on 
earth  !'  "  And  the  third  :  "  '  1  had  rather  be  Sir  Charles 
Grandison  in  this  one  past  hour,  than  the  Great  Mogul  all 
my  life.'"  "And  Sir  Hargrave  even  sobbed."  He  has, 
too,  great  skill  Avith  the  SAvord,  so  that  when  he  was  set 
upon  by  two  ruffians  in  his  own  house,  he  disarmed  them 
both  and  turned  them  out-of-doors.    He  mourns,  however, 


English  Literature.  343 

that  be  has  been  "  provoked  by  two  such  men  to  violate 
tbe  sanctity  of  his  own  house."  This  is  the  only  crime 
even  his  morbid  conscience  can  convict  him  of,  and  his 
excuse  is  "that  there  were  two  of  them  ;  and  that  though 
I  drew,  yet  I  had  the  command  of  myself  so  far  as  only  to 
defend  myself,  when  I  might  have  done  with  them  what  I 
pleased."  And  indeed  he  was  doubly  armed,  for  not  only 
could  he  disarm  two  antagonists  at  a  time,  but  even  with- 
out his  sword  he  was  secure,  for  he  once  talked  one  of  the 
wicked  into  a  fit. 

However,  this  unsympathetic  description  of  the  book 
does  not  describe  it  as  it  seemed  to  our  ancestors  or  in- 
deed to  us  when  we  read  it.  It  does  no  justice  to  the 
manner  in  which,  in  spite  of  the  exaggeration  of  the  hero's 
virtues,  the  life  of  that  day  is  represented.  What  he  did 
was  to  give  us  realistic  drawings  of  impossible  people. 
Every  line  in  their  faces  is  from  life  ;  they  move  about 
the  room,  open  and  shut  doors,  talk,  and  act  apparently  as 
people  do  in  real  life  ;  their  emotions  are  described  with 
the  most  cunning  art,  yet  they  lack  the  highest  truth. 
They  do  not  so  much  follow  the  laws  of  their  own  charac- 
ter as  they  do  Richardson's  ever-present  desire  to  serve  the 
highest  morality.  This  is  the  artistic  fault  of  the  novels, 
and  the  reason  why  they  are  left  stranded  on  the  dusty 
shelves,  for  no  moral  excellence  will  long  take  the  place 
of  truth.  The  novels  carried  too  heavy  a  load  of  instruc- 
tion, and  it  finally  swamped  them.  Yet  when  the  general 
tendency  of  the  age  lay  in  the  direction  of  moral  teaching, 
these  books  were  enormously  admired,  especially  when  they 
were  almost  without  rivals,  and  their  truthfulness  in  regard 
to  many  matters  of  detail  aided  their  influence.  Through 
them  spoke  one  of  the  main  inspirations  of  the  time,  the 
new  power  of  the  middle  class,  and  its  revolt  against  aris- 
tocratic corruption.     This  tendency  in  literature  was  as 


344  English  Literature: 

firmly  connected  with  political  tendencies,  as  nowadays 
the  drawing  of  pictures  from  still  lower  life  is  indissolu- 
bly  connected  with  the  gropings  of  the  laboring  classes 
for  power.  The  fact  that  the  social  difference  between 
Pamela,  the  serving-maid,  and  her  aristocratic  master,  is 
broken  down  by  means  of  her  superior  moral  qualities, 
shows  this.  Pamela  remarks  somewhere  that  the  skull  of 
a  king  is  like  that  of  a  poor  man  ;  that  princes  and  beggars 
must  alike  appear  before  the  judgment-seat.  It  is  not  long 
before  the  notion  of  equality,  when  it  has  got  thus  far,  is 
transferred  from  the  next  world  to  this.  When  she  hears 
that  her  master  is  to  be  made  a  peer,  she  says  it  would  be 
better  if  he  were  made  a  virtuous  man.  Social  distinctions 
begin  to  be  threatened  when  remarks  of  this  kind  are  made. 

On  the  other  hand,  "  Sir  Charles  Grandison  "  is  an  ap- 
peal in  the  direction  of  conservatism  by  showing  the  great 
how  they  should  live — how,  if  they  are  virtuous,  their  de- 
pendents will  be  peaceable  and  contented.  It  is  easy  for 
us  to  see  that  the  solution  of  these  difficulties  may  have 
appeared  simple  to  Richardson,  yet  his  moral  lessons  were 
thrown  away,  and  the  French  Revolution  came  at  last. 
Just  as  now,  especially  in  Europe,  Nihilism  in  various 
forms  lies  smouldering  beneath  the  surface,  and  those  in 
authority  seek  their  own  pleasure  and  aggrandizement  as 
if  the  future  contained  no  perils  and  the  past  no  lessons. 
In  time,  perhaps,  the  essential  interdependence  of  all  parts 
of  the  state  will  be  recognized  ;  it  will  not  be  in  fiction 
alone  that  working-men  will  be  objects  of  interest. 

In  Germany,  the  influence  of  Richardson's  novels  was 
very  great.*  Gellert  wrote  of  him  ("  Ueber  Richardson's 
Bildniss  ")  : 

"  Unstevblich  ist  Homer,  unsterblioher  bei  Christeu 
Der  Britte  Ricliaiilson." 

*  Vide  Erich  Schmidt's  "Richardson,  Rousseau  und  Goethe,"  p.  11. 


English  Literature.  345 

Translations  flooded  the  market.  Gellert,  too,  in  1746, 
wrote  his  novel  "  Das  Leben  der  schwedischen  Griifin  von 
G.  .  .  .  "in  close  imitation  of  Richardson.  Other  writers 
followed  ui  the  same  path. 

Rousseau's  famous  novel,"  La  Nouvelle  Heloise  "  (1761), 
is  the  most  important  of  the  books  that  drew  inspiration 
from  Richardson ;  and  from  the  impetus  given  by  the  "  Nou- 
velle Heloise  "  *  started  much  of  the  spirit  that  animated 
"Werther."  While  Richardson's  influence  thus  spread 
over  the  Continent,  in  England  his  impossible  heroes  and 
heroines  were  about  to  succumb  to  a  strong  reaction. f 

What  deposed  Richardson  from  the  undivided  suprem- 
acy which  he  held  in  England  was  the  appearance  of  Field- 
ing, whose  characters  are  certainly  far  from  idealized. 
Fielding,  after  a  life  of  varying  experience  as  a  theatre- 
manager,  a  student,  a  man  of  fortune,  and  a  playwright, 
being  reduced  to  such  a  condition  that,  as  he  said,  he  had 
no  choice  but  to  be  a  hackney- writer  or  a  hackney-coach- 
man, wrote  his  first  novel  really  under  something  like  dis- 
gust with  Richardson's  pious  devotion  to  respectability. 

*  Was  not  Rousseau  indebted  to  the  matronly  Richardson  for  some  part 
of  his  zeal  in  urging  that  mothers  nurse  their  children  ?  Vide  "  Sir  Charles 
Grandison,"  letter  ccc.  As  to  Rousseau's  notions  about  the  management 
of  a  household  in  the  latter  part  of  "  La  Xouvelle  Heloise,"  cf.  "  Sir  Charles 
Grandison,"  letter  cclxvi.,  and  "Pamela,"  letter  xc. 

■)•  England  has  often  begun  a  movement  that  it  has  itself  in  good  part 
ignored,  letting  it  pass  over  to  the  Continent,  and  only  fully  receiving  it 
after  it  has  been  trimmed  and  put  into  shape  and  has  become  universal 
property.  Thus,  Locke's  philosophy,  to  some  extent  the  family  novel,  and 
more  recently  Darwinism,  which  is  held  by  a  few  able  men,  but  has  not 
thoroughly  penetrated  the  universities,  and  is  not  the  inspiring  spirit  of 
students  to  anything  like  the  same  extent  as  in  Germany,  or  as  in  the 
France  of  the  last  few  years. 

ETigland  produces  the  raw  material,  sends  it  off,  and  imports  it  again 
made  up,  as  the  Southerners  do  with  their  cotton. 

15* 


■-^ 


346  English.  Literature. 

It  was  not  ordinary  literary  jealousy  that  inspired  him, 
but  a  reaction  against  the  morbid  tendencies  of  Richard- 
son's novels,*  If  these  seem  to  draw  their  inspiration 
from  tea  and  toast,  Fielding's  have  the  full  flavor  of 
beer  and  tobacco  ;  and  no  greater  contrast  can  be  im- 
agined than  that  between  Sir  Charles  Grandison  and 
Fielding's  hearty,  roystering,  careless,  happy-go-lucky 
heroes.  Richardson's  people  seem  to  be  crouching  over  a 
fire  in  a  parlor  ;  Fielding's  are  forever  laughing  through 
the  w^orld,  beginning,  enjoying,  or  getting  over  a  carouse. 
They  are,  from  one  point  of  view,  brutal  fellows  —  for 
Fielding  lived  in  a  coarse  time,  among  a  coarse  people — 
but  they  are  at  least  human.  The  adventurous  picaresque 
stories  have  borne  fruit  here,  although  much  of  it  is  of  a 
sort  that  we  cannot  admire  now.  Who,  for  instance,  over 
the  age  of  fourteen,  can  get  any  amusement  from  the  ac- 
count of  Parson  Adams's  visit  to  Parson  Trulliber  ?  Par- 
son Adams  is  simply  one  of  the  simplest,  most  lovable 
characters  in  fiction,  and  Fielding  treats  him  as  a  jocose 
savage  would  treat  a  captive  :  he  rolls  him  in  the  mire, 
ducks  him,  and  plays  rough  tricks  on  him  in  a  way  that 
would  shame  a  schoolboy.  Here  is  the  incident  with  Par- 
son Trulliber  :  Parson  Adams  determines  to  make  him  a 
visit  ;  Mr.  Trulliber,  who  had  just  been  feeding  his  pigs, 
"immediately  slipped  off  his  apron  and  clothed  himself  in 
an  old  night-gown,  being  the  dress  in  which  he  always 
received  company.  His  wife,  Avho  informed  him  of  Mr. 
Adams's  arrival,  had  made  a  small  mistake  ;  for  she  had 
told  her  liusband,  '  she  believed  here  was  a  man  come  for 

*  Others,  too,  thought  Richardson  inexact.  Vide  "  Letters  anil  Works 
of  Lady  Mary  Wortley  Montagu"  (London,  1837),  iii.  40,  letter  of  Oct. 
20,  IT.jfi.  Compare,  too,  his  "  Sir  Cliarles  Grandison  "  witii  Mrs.  Sheridan's 
vivid  "  Memoirs  of  Miss  Sidney  Bidiiiph,"  which  appeared  in  1761,  the  year 
of  Richardson's  death. 


Engliiih  Literature.  347 

some  of  his  hogs.'  This  supposition  made  Mr.  Trulliber 
hasten  with  the  utmost  expedition  to  attend  his  guest. 
He  no  sooner  saw  Adams  than,  not  in  the  least  doubting 
the  cause  of  his  errand  to  be  what  his  wife  had  imagined, 
he  told  him,  '  he  was  come  in  very  good  time  ;  that  he  ex- 
pected a  dealer  that  very  afternoon  ;'  and  added,  '  they 
were  all  pure  and  fat,  and  upwards  of  twenty  score 
a-piece.'  Adams  answered,  '  He  believed  he  did  not  know 
him.'  'Yes,  yes,'  cried  Trulliber,  'I  have  seen  you  often 
at  fair  ;  w  hy,  we  have  dealt  before  now,  mun,  I  warrant 
you.  Yes,  yes,'  cries  he,  '  I  remember  thy  face  very  well, 
l)ut  won't  mention  a  word  more  till  you  have  seen  them, 
though  I  have  never  sold  thee  a  flitch  of  such  bacon  as  is 
now  in  the  stye.'  Upon  which  he  laid  violent  hands  011 
Adams,  and  dragged  him  into  the  hog-stye,  which  was  in- 
deed but  two  ste])s  from  his  parlour-window.  They  were 
no  sooner  arrived  there  than  he  cried  out,  '  Do  but  handle 
them  ;  step  in,  friend  ;  art  welcome  to  handle  them,  wheth- 
er dost  buy  or  no.'  At  which  words,  opening  the  gate,  he 
pushed  Adams  into  the  pig-stye,  insisting  on  it  that  he 
should  handle  them  before  he  would  talk  one  word  with 
him. 

"Adams,  whose  natural  complacence  was  beyond  any 
artificial,  was  obliged  to  comply  before  he  was  suffered  to 
explain  himself  ;  and  laying  hold  on  one  of  their  tails,  the 
unruly  beast  gave  such  a  sudden  spring,  that  he  threw  poor 
Adams  all  along  in  the  mire.  Trulliber,  instead  of  assist- 
ing him  to  get  up,  burst  into  a  laughter,  and  entering  the 
stye,  said  to  Adams,  with  some  contempt,  'Why,  dost  not 
know  how  to  handle  a  hog  ?' "  and  Adams  explained  that 
he  was  a  clergyman,  and  had  not  come  to  buy  pigs.  Af- 
ter breakfast,  Adams  explains  his  errand,  which  is  to  bor- 
row fourteen  shillings,  and,  after  a  really  amusing  scene, 
he  withdraws  as  poor  as  he  came. 


348  Enijlhh  Literature. 

This  is  the  way  Fiehling  describes  it :  "  A  while  he 
[Trulliber]  rolled  his  eyes  in  silence  ;  sometimes  sur- 
veying Adams,  then  his  wife  ;  then  casting  them  on  the 
ground  ;  then  lifting  them  up  to  heaven.  At  last  he  burst 
forth  in  the  following  accents  :  '  Sir,  I  believe  I  know 
where  to  lay  up  my  little  treasure  as  well  as  another.  I 
thank  G — ,  if  I  am  not  so  warm  as  some,  I  am  content ; 
that  is  a  blessing  greater  than  riches  ;  and  he  to  whom 
that  is  given  need  ask  no  more.  To  be  content  with  little 
is  greater  than  to  possess  the  world ;  which  a  man  may 
possess  without  being  so.  Lay  up  my  treasure  !  What 
matters  where  a  man's  treasure  is  whose  heart  is  in  the 
Scripture  ?  there  is  the  treasure  of  a  Christian.'  At  these 
words  the  water  ran  from  Adams's  eyes  ;  and  catching 
Trulliber  by  the  hand  in  a  rapture,  '  Brother,'  says  he, 
'  heavens  bless  the  accident  by  which  I  came  to  see  you  ! 
I  would  have  walked  many  a  mile  to  commune  with  you  ; 
and,  believe  me,  I  will  shortly  pay  you  a  second  visit  ;  but 
my  friends,  I  fancy,  by  this  time,  wonder  at  my  stay  ;  so 
let  me  have  the  money  immediately.'  Trulliber  then  put 
on  a  stern  look,  and  cried  out,  '  Thou  dost  not  intend  to 
rob  me  ?'  At  which  the  wife,  bursting  into  tears,  fell  on 
her  knees,  and  roared  out, '  O  dear  sir  !  for  heaven's  sake 
don't  rob  my  master  :  we  are  but  poor  people.'  '  Get  up, 
for  a  fool  as  thou  art,  and  go  about  thy  business,'  said 
Trulliber  ;  '  dost  think  the  man  will  venture  his  life  ?  he 
is  a  beggar  and  no  robber.'  ...  *  But  suppose  I  am  not  a 
clergyman,  I  am  nevertheless  thy  brother  ;  and  thou,  as  a 
Christian,  much  more  as  a  clergyman,  art  obliged  to  re- 
lieve my  distress.'  '  Don't  preach  to  me  !'  re])lied  Trulli- 
ber :  '  dost  ])retend  to  instruct  me  in  my  duty?'  'I  fack, 
a  good  story,'  cries  Mrs.  Ti-ullil)er,  '  to  preach  to  my  mas- 
ter.' 'Silence,  woman,'  cries  Trulliber.  'I  would  have 
tlioe  know,  friend  (addressing  himself  to  Adams),  I  shall 


English  Literature.  349 

not  learn  my  duty  from  such  as  tbee.  I  know  what  chari- 
ty is,  better  than  to  give  to  vagabonds.'  .  .  .  '  I  am  sorry,' 
answered  Adams,  '  that  you  do  know  what  charity  is,  since 
you  practise  it  no  better  :  I  must  tell  you,  if  you  trust  to 
your  knowledge  for  your  justification,  you  will  find  your- 
self deceived,  though  you  should  add  faith  to  it,  without 
good  works.'  '  Fellow,' cries  Trulliber,  '  dost  thou  speak 
against  faith  in  my  house  ?  Get  out  of  my  doors  :  I  will 
no  longer  remain  under  the  same  roof  with  a  witch  who 
speaks  wantonly  of  faith  and  the  Scriptures.'  '  Name  not 
the  Scriptures,'  says  Adams.  '  How,  not  name  the  Script- 
ures !  Do  you  disbelieve  the  Scri})tures  ?'  cries  Trulliber. 
*No,  but  you  do,'  answered  Adams,  'if  I  may  reason 
from  your  practice  ;  for  their  commands  are  so  explicit, 
and  their  rewards  and  punishments  are  so  immense,  that 
it  is  impossible  a  man  should  stedfastly  believe  without 
obeying.  Now,  there  is  no  command  more  express,  no  duty 
more  frequently  enjoined,  than  charity.  Whoever,  there- 
fore, is  void  of  charity,  I  make  no  scruple  of  pronouncing 
that  he  is  no  Christian.'  '  I  would  not  advise  thee,'  says 
Trulliber,  '  to  say  that  I  am  no  Christian  :  I  won't  take  it 
of  you  ;  for  I  believe  I  am  as  good  a  man  as  thyself.'  .  .  . 
His  wife,  seeing  him  clench  his  fist,  interposed,  and  begged 
him  not  to  fight,  but  to  show  himself  a  true  Christian,  and 
take  the  law  of  him.  As  nothing  could  provoke  Adams 
to  strike,  but  an  absolute  assault  on  himself  or  his  friend, 
he  smiled  at  the  angry  looks  and  gestures  of  Trulliber  ; 
and  telling  him  he  was  sorry  to  see  such  men  in  orders, 
departed  without  further  ceremony." 

Here  the  later  scene  relieves  the  horse-play  of  the  first 
part,  but  the  reader  wearies  of  the  perpetual  practical 
jokes  of  which  Adams  is  the  object.  Such  a  case  was 
that  where  he  was  reminded  that  in  ancient  days  it  was 
customary  to  receive  a  philosopher  in  great  state.     Ac- 


350  Enyliisli  Literature. 

cording  to  the  proposer  of  the  plan,  it  was  a  favorite 
method  of  receiving  Socrates.  "  There  was  a  throne 
erected,  on  one  side  of  which  sat  a  king,  and  on  the  other 
a  queen,  with  their  guards  and  attendants  ranged  on  both 
sides  ;  to  them  was  introduced  an  ambassador,  which 
part  Socrates  always  used  to  perform  himself;  and  when 
he  was  led  up  to  the  footsteps  of  the  throne,  he  addressed 
himself  to  the  monarchs  in  some  grave  speech,  full  of 
virtue,  goodness,  morality,  and  such  like.  After  which, 
he  was  seated  between  the  king  and  queen,  and  royally 
entertained.  This,  I  think,  was  the  chief  part." .  .  .  Adams 
said,  "  It  was  indeed  a  relaxation  worthy  of  so  great  a 
man  ;  and  thought  something  resembling  it  should  be 
instituted  among  our  great  men,  instead  of  cards  and 
other  idle  pastime,  in  which,  he  was  informed,  they 
trifled  away  too  much  of  their  lives."  So  the  plan  was 
carried  out  ;  Parson  Adams  read  his  sermon,  to  the  great 
entertainment  of  all  present,  and  then  was  invited  to  sit 
down  between  their  majesties.  As  he  sat  they  rose,  and 
he  sank  into  the  tub  of  water  that  awaited  him.  The 
king  he  also  ducked  ;  then  he  left  the  house,  catching  a 
cold,  "  which  threw  him  into  a  fever  that  had  like  to  have 
cost  him  his  life."  Some  of  this  inexhaustible  boyishness 
may  be  merely  the  result  of  Fielding's  impatience  with  the 
superfine  priggishness  of  Richardson's  novels,  and  in  part 
a  precise  copy  of  the  rough  life  that  he  had  himself  seen. 
Some,  too,  is  to  be  accounted  for  by  the  model  which  he 
chose — indeed,  one  may  almost  say,  the  only  model  that  lay 
before  hira — the  picaresque  novel,  for  it  was  in  the  manner 
of  "  Don  Quixote,"  as  he  himself  avowed  on  his  title-page, 
that  the  novel  was  written.  And  it  is  to  this  book,  or  at 
least  to  the  spirit  which  animated  it,  and  to  others  of  the 
fflame  kind,  as  Scarron's  "  Roman  Comique,"  that  he  was 
indebted  for  the  mock-heroic  style,  the  caricature  of  the 


Eni/Ush  Literature.  35 1 

old  romances,  that  is  to  be  found  in  both  "  Joseph  An- 
drews "  and  "  Tom  Jones  " — e.  g.,  "  Now  the  rake  Hesperus 
had  called  for  his  breeches,  and,  having  well  rubbed  his 
drowsy  eyes,  prepared  to  dress  himself  for  all  night,"  etc. 
The  perpetual  beatings  of  Parson  Adams  are,  too,  another 
reminiscence  of  "  Don  Quixote."  The  introduction  of  the 
episode  of  Leonora  in  "  Joseph  Andrews  "  is  sanctioned, 
it  will  be  remembered,  by  the  example  of  the  picaresque 
novels. 

Yet  the  resemblance  to  "  Don  Quixote  "  is  but  an  ex- 
ternal one.  Fielding  has  none  of  the  poetical  spirit  which 
inspired  Cervantes  to  write  one  of  the  few  greatest  works 
of  literature,  a  book  of  which  it  is  but  the  smallest  merit 
that  it  expelled  from  literature  the  obsolescent  romance. 
Life  has  no  complexity  in  Fielding's  eyes  ;  it  has  troubles, 
to  be  sure,  but  they  are  veiy  simple  troubles,  such  as  tor- 
menting creditors,  the  next  day's  headache,  the  difficulty 
of  finding  ready  money.  He  does  not  approach  that  more 
important  field  of  the  conti*ast  between  the  imagination 
and  the  lessons  of  reality  which  is  described  allegorically 
in  the  story  of  the  Don  and  his  squire.  Nor  did  Smollett 
do  more.  They  both  kept  closely  to  their  task  of  draw- 
ing life  as  they  saw  it,  and  whoever  does  this  does  some- 
thing rare  and  admirable.  Yet  the  general  movement  of 
the  novel  was  away  from  them.  They  brought  to  its 
highest  development  the  novel  of  incident,  of  life,  and 
they  paid  no  attention  to  the  wave  of  sentimentality  that 
was  bedewing  the  eyes  of  half  of  their  contemporaries. 
The  other  half  undoubtedly  enjoyed  the  rough  heartiness 
of  these  writers,  and  we  may  see,  in  the  controversy  which 
Sterne  excited,  that  at  length  public  opinion  was  ceasing 
to  be  a  unit.  Litei\ature  was  beginning  to  be  divided  into 
sets,  as  various  influences  were  at  work  to  affect  men's 
minds.     I  have  just  mentioned  Sterne,  and  it  is  interest- 


35?  English  Literature. 

ing  to  notice  that  the  first  volume  of  his  "  Tristram 
Shandy"  was  written  in  1759,  ten  years  after  the  publi- 
cation of  "  Tom  Jones."  At  this  time  Sterne  was  forty- 
six  years  old.  As  his  books  show,  he  had  dabbled  in 
old  French  writers,  as,  indeed,  had  many  of  his  contem- 
poraries and  predecessors,  for  a  number  of  the  light 
songs  of  Suckling,  the  poets  of  the  Restoration,  of  Prior, 
etc.,  are  translated  from  that  language.*  It  was  not  only 
in  Rabelais  that  Sterne  found  a  precedent  for  his  endless 
digressions  ;  other  Frenchmen  had  followed  that  great 
model.  It  was  a  new  kind  of  writing  in  England,  how- 
ever, and  the  publishers  would  have  nothing  to  do  with 
it,  so  that  Sterne  had  the  first  two  volumes  printed  at 
York,  at  his  own  expense.  He  swiftly  found  himself 
famous.  Two  hundred  copies  were  sold  in  the  first  two 
days  —  a  large  number  for  the  time,  although  in  1*751 
Fielding's  "  Amelia "  was  issued,  of  whieh  Dr.  Johnson 
said,  "  it  was  perhaps  the  only  book  of  which,  being 
printed  ofi'  betimes  one  morning,  a  new  edition  was  called 
for  before  night."  But  Fielding  was  a  famous  novelist, 
and  Sterne  was  unknown  outside  of  the  circle  of  his 
friends.  In  a  few  months  Sterne  went  to  London  to 
taste  the  sweets  of  popularity,  and  few  have  ever  had 
such  great  success.  Indeed,  he  was  only  outdone  by 
Byron  in  this  respect,  and  Byron  had  many  other  advan- 
tages— youth,  beauty,  and  rank.  Sterne  was  at  once  the 
rage.  Salads,  games  of  cards,  race-horses,  and  doubtless 
hats,  were  named  "  Tristram  Shandy."  Reynolds  painted 
the  author's  portrait ;    Hogarth  designed   a  frontispiece 

*  For  exnmple,  "  La  Fleur  des  Chansons  Amoreuscs"  (Rouen,  dr.  1600; 
reprinted  J^russels,  1806)  contains  the  French  originals  of  some  of  Sucli- 
ling's  and  Dryden's  songs,  as  well  as  what  was  probably  the  original  of 
the  song  printed  in  the  "  Golden  Treasury,"  "  While  that  the  sun  with  his 
beams  hot." 


English  Literature.  353 

for  the  book  ;  Warburton,  Pope's  friend,  in  January, 
1760,  bishop  of  Gloucester,  recommended  the  novel  to  his 
brother-bishops,  and  Sterne  found  himself  suddenly  lifted 
out  of  obscurity  and  become  a  popular  idol.  Alongside 
of  warm  praise,  there  was  much  powerful  opposition. 
Horace  Walpole  said  :  "  At  present,  nothing  is  talked  of, 
nothing  admired,  but  what  I  cannot  help  calling  a  very 
,  insipid  and  tedious  performance  :  it  is  a  kind  of  novel, 
called  '  The  Life  and  Opinions  of  Tristram  Shandy  ;'  the 
great  humour  of  which  consists  in  the  whole  narration 
always  going  backwards.  I  can  conceive  a  man  saying 
that  it  would  be  droll  to  write  a  book  in  that  manner,  but 
have  no  notion  of  his  persevering  in  executing  it.  It 
makes  one  smile  two  or  three  times  at  the  beginning, 
but  in  recompense  makes  one  yawn  for  two  hours.  The 
characters  are  tolerably  kept  up,  but  the  humour  is  for- 
ever attempted  and  missed."  * 

Goldsmith,  in  his  "  Citizen  of  the  World,"  said  :  "  There 

*  Walpole's  literary  judgments  are  curious  :  "  I  had  rather  have  written, 
the  most  absurd  Ihies  in  Lee  than  '  Leonidas '  or  the  '  Seasons.'  .  .  .  There 
is  another  of  these  tame  geniuses,  a  Mr.  Akenside,  who  writes  odes  :  in  one 
of  them  he  has  lately  published,  he  says,  '  Light  the  tapers,  urge  the  fire.' 
Had  not  you  rather  make  gods  jostle  in  the  dark  than  light  the  candles 
for  fear  they  should  break  their  heads  ?"  "  I  have  no  desire  to  know  the 
rest  of  my  contemporaries,  from  the  absurd  bombast  of  Dr.  Johnson, 
down  to  the  silly  Dr.  Goldsmith  ;  though  the  latter  changeling  has  had 
bright  gleams  of  parts,  and  the  former  had  sense  till  he  changed  it  for 
words,  and  sold  it  for  a  pension." 

About  the  "Botanic  Garden,"  he  says:  "I  send  you  the  most  delicious 
poem  upon  earth.  If  you  don't  know  what  it  is  all  about,  or  why,  at  least 
you  will  find  glorious  similes  about  everything  in  the  world,  and  I  defy 
vou  to  discover  three  bad  verses  in  the  whole  stock,"  etc.  And  to  Jeph- 
son,  about  his  "  Braganza :"  "  You  seem  to  me  to  have  imitated  Beaumont 
and  Fletcher,  though  your  play  is  superior  to  all  theirs.  .  .  .  You  are  so 
great  a  poet,  Sir,  that  you  have  no  occasion  to  labour  anything  but  your 
plots,"  etc. 


354  English  Literature. 

are  several  very  dull  fellows  who,  by  a  few  mechanical 
helps,  sometimes  learn  to  become  extremely  brilliant  and 
amusing,  with  a  little  dexterity  in  the  management  of  the 
eyebrows,  lingers,  and  nose.  .  .  .  But  the  writer  finds  it 
impossible  to  throw  his  winks,  his  shrugs,  or  his  attitudes, 
upon  paper.  ...  As  in  common  conversation,  the  best 
way  to  make  the  audience  laugh  is  by  first  laughing  your- 
self ;  so  in  writing,  the  properest  manner  is  to  show  an 
attempt  at  humour,  which  will  pass  upon  most  for  humour 
in  reality.  To  effect  this,  readers  must  be  treated  with 
the  most  perfect  familiarity  :  in  one  page  the  author  is  to 
make  them  a  low  bow,  and  in  the  next  to  pull  them  by  the 
nose  ;  he  must  talk  in  riddles,  and  then  send  them  to  bed 
in  order  to  dream  for  the  solution.  He  must  speak  of 
himself,  and  his  chapters,  his  manner,  and  what  he  would 
be  at,  and  his  own  importance,  and  his  mother's  impor- 
tance, with  the  most  unpitying  prolixity  ;  and  now  and 
then  testifying  his  contempt  for  all  but  himself,  smiling 
without  a  jest,  and  without  wit  pi'ofessing  vivacity"  (let- 
ter lii.).  Richardson,  who  certainly  was  not  a  man  of 
wide  literary  taste,  thought  the  "book  execrable,  and  Dr. 
Johnson  despised  it.  The  difference  of  opinion  among 
men  of  authority  soon  expressed  itself  in  print  ;  pam- 
phlets, it  is  said,  were  printed  on  each  side,  but  Sterne's 
popularity  among  his  friends  was  preserved  by  his  per- 
petual wit.  Warburton  gave  him  a  great  deal  of  ^ood 
advice  which  he  did  not  take,  and  a  purse  of  gold  waiph 
he  did  ;  but  finally  the  bishop  grew  weary  of  his  new 
friend,  and,  after  passing  through  the  stage  of  indifference, 
reached  that  of  positive  aversion,  and  he  finally  called 
Sterne  an  irrevocable  scoundrel.  But  Avhat  did  Sterne 
care  for  that  ?  He  was  given  a  new  vicarage,  which  he 
called  Shandy  Hall,  the  name  it  still  bears,  and  made  over 
his  other  parishes  to  a  curate.     He  had  hopes  of  being 


EnglUh  Littraiure.  355 

made  a  bishop,  but  the  accession  of  George  III.  destroyed 
these.  He  found  consolation  in  more  worldly  pleasures. 
"  I  never  dined  at  home  once  since  I  arrived — am  four- 
teen dinners  deep  engaged  just  now,  and  fear  matters  will 
be  worse  with  me  in  that  point  than  better."  And  again, 
after  the  publication  of  two  more  volumes  :  "  One  half  of. 
the  town  abuse  my  book  as  bitterly  as  the  other  half  cry 
it  up  to  the  skies  ;  the  best  is  they  abuse  and  buy  it,  and 
at  such  a  rate  that  we  are  going  on  with  a  second  edition 
as  fast  as  possible." 

What  is  to  be  noticed  is  this — that  the  modern  men 
praised  him,  the  old-fashioned  condemned  him.  He  rep- 
resented a  considerable  part  of  the  new  spirit  that  was 
spreading  over  Europe,  the  sensibility  that  was  weeping 
over  Rousseau  and  preparing  to  weep  over  the  young 
Werther.  The  reaction  against  the  long  reign  of  reason 
was  wide-spread,  and  was  naturally  detested  by  those  who 
were  satisfied  by  the  old  order  of  things.  Even  now, 
when  we  have  learned  to  be  tolerant  of  the  eccentricity 
of  other  ages,  it  is  hard  to  read  with  patience  Sterne's  dis- 
cursive pages,  and  wo  can  readily  understand  the  feelings 
of  those  who  fancied  that  grinning  through  a  horse-collar 
was  a  dignified  amusement  by  the  side  of  composing  pas- 
sages like  this  :  "  Ptr — r — r — ing,  twing, — twang,  prut, 
prut,  'tis  a  cursed  bad  fiddle  !  Do  you  know  whether  my 
fiddle's  in  tune  or  no  ?  They  should  be  fifths. — 'Tis  evi- 
dently strung — tr-a-e-i-o-u — twang —  The  bridge  is  a 
mile  too  high,  and  the  '  sovmd  post '  absolutely  down,  else 

— trut,  prut Hark,  'tis  not  so  bad  a  tone.     Diddle, 

diddle,  diddle,  diddle,  dum twaddle-diddle,  tweedle- 

diddle,  twiddle-diddle,  twoddle-diddle,  tweedle-diddle — 
prxit — trut — krish — krash — krush.  We  have  undone  you, 
sir,  but  you  see  he  is  no  worse."  And  the  book  is  crammed 
with  these  tedious  attempts  at  facetiousness,  these  fling- 


35^  English  Literature. 

ings  of  the  heels  into  the  air,  the  natural  result  of  the 
escape  from  long  repression.  They  serve  now  but  to 
establish  one  undeniable  truth  that  is  too  often  forgotten, 
that  excess  on  one  side  is  followed  by  excess  on  the  other  ; 
that  the  pendulum,  if  it  starts  from  a  high  place  on  the 
right  side,  will  reach  a  high  point  on  the  left.  The  true 
place  will  be  reached  in  time,  but  the  first  impulse  is 
pi-obably  an  excessive  one.  We  see,  for  instance,  in 
French  fiction  of  the  present  day  a  violent  reaction  from 
the  artificial  methods  of  romanticism,  a  marked  depart- 
ure from  the  civilized  fairy-land  in  which  for  a  long  time 
writers  have  placed  the  scene  of  their  books — and  the  new 
men  go  just  as  far  in  the  other  way  ;  they  oJBPend  us  by 
going  so  far  from  fairy-land  into  the  territory  of  foulness 
that  they  are  condemned  more  than  is  perhaps  right. 
They  will  probably  be  followed  by  men  who  will  be  more 
moderate.  One  thing  we  may  be  sure  of,  the  world  will 
not  go  back  to  the  belief  in  the  things  which  they  have 
demolished.  Tastes  may  differ,  and  swing  from  one  side  to 
the  other,  but  men  cannot  return  to  old  opinions.  They 
try  to  do  it  ;  they  struggle  to  be  simple,  but  the  very 
effort  destroys  simplicity.  This,  however,  is  a  digression. 
What  has  made  "  Tristram  Shandy"  an  immortal  book  is 
the  pathos  and  humor  with  which  Mr.  Shandy  and  his 
brother,  Uncle  Toby,  are  described.  Here  and  there, 
amid  affectation,  tediousness,  and  odious  leering,  we  come 
across  passages  that  stand  out  like  fine  paintings  in  a  large 
gallery  crowded  with  third  or  fourth  rate  work.  It  was 
not  only  Sterne's  restless  style  that  enraged  half  his  hear- 
ers, it  was  the  attack  he  made  on  the  literary  princij)les 
that  governed  the  world.  Thus  (bk.  i.  chap,  iv.) :  "  I  know 
there  are  readers  in  the  world,  as  well  as  many  other 
good  people  in  it,  wlio  arc  no  readers  at  all, — who  find 
themselves  ill  at  ease,  unless  they  are  let  into  the  whole 


English  Literature.  357 

secret  from  first  to  last,  of  everything  which  concerns 
you. 

"It  is  in  pure  compliance  with  this  humour  of  theirs, 
and  from  a  backwardness  in  my  nature  to  disappoint  any 
one  soul  living,  that  I  have  been  so  very  particular  already. 
As  my  life  and  opinions  are  likely  to  make  some  noise  in 
the  world,  and,  if  I  conjecture  right,  will  take  in  all  ranks, 
professions,  and  denominations  of  men  whatever, — be  no 
less  read  than  the  '  Pilgrim's  Progress '  itself — and,  in  the 
end,  prove  the  very  thing  which  Montaigne  dreaded  his 
essays  should  turn  out,  that  is,  a  book  for  a  parlour-win- 
dow,— I  find  it  necessary  to  consult  every  one  a  little  to 
his  turn  ;  and  therefore  must  beg  pardon  for  going  on  a 
little  further  in  the  same  way  :  For  which  cause,  right 
glad  I  am,  that  I  have  begun  the  history  of  myself  in  the 
way  I  have  done  ;  and  that  I  am  able  to  go  on  tracing 
everything  in  it,  as  Horace  says,  ah  ovo. 

"  Horace,  I  know,  does  not  recommend  this  fashion  al- 
together :  But  that  gentleman  is  speaking  only  of  an  epic 
poem  or  a  tragedy  (I  forget  which), — besides,  if  it  was  not 
so,  I  should  beg  Mr.  Horace's  pardon  ;  for  in  writing  M'hat 
I  have  set  about,  I  shall  confine  myself  neither  to  his  rules, 
nor  to  any  man's  rules  that  ever  lived." 

And  again  with  the  dedication  (bk.  i.  chap,  xix.)  :  "  But, 
indeed,  to  speak  of  my  father  as  he  was  ; — he  was  cer- 
tainly irresistible  both  in  his  orations  and  disputations  ;  he 
was  born  an  orator,  QtoliluKTOQ.  Persuasion  hung  upon 
his  lips,  and  the  elements  of  Logic  and  Rhetoric  were  so 
blended  up  in  him — and,  withal,  he  had  so  shrewd  a  guess 
at  the  weaknesses  and  passions  of  his  respondent — that 
nature  might  have  stood  up  and  said — '  This  man  is  elo- 
quent.' In  short,  whether  he  was  on  the  weak  or  the 
strong  side  of  the  question  'twas  hazardous  in  either 
case  to  attack  him.     And  yet,  'tis  strange,  he  had  never 


358  English  Literature. 

read  Cicero,  nor  Quintilian  de  Oratore,  nor  Isocrates, 
nor  Aristotle,  nor  Longinus,  amongst  the  ancients  ;  nor 
Vossius,  nor  Skioppius,  nor  Ramus,  nor  Farnaby  amongst 
the  moderns  ;  and  what  is  more  astonishing,  he  had  never 
in  his  whole  life  the  least  light  or  spark  of  subtilty  struck 
into  his  mind,  by  one  single  lecture  on  Crackenthorp  or 
Burgersdicius  or  any  Dutch  logician  or  commentator  ; — he 
knew  not  so  much  as  in  what  the  difference  of  an  argu- 
ment ad  ignorantiam,  and  an  argument  ad  hominem  con- 
sisted ;  so  that  I  well  remember,  when  he  went  up  along 
with  me  to  enter  my  name  at  Jesus  College  in  .  ,  .  ,  it  was 
a  matter  of  just  wonder  with  my  worthy  tutor  and  two 
or  three  fellows  of  that  learned  society — that  a  man  who 
knew  not  so  much  as  the  names  of  his  tools,  should  be 
able  to  work  after  that  fashion  with  them."  Jesting  of 
this  sort  must  have  seemed  singularly  irreverent  to  some 
of  Sterne's  contemporaries. 

The  book  abounds  with  such  passages  (bk.  iii.  chap, 
xxiv.) :  "  I  care  not  what  Aristotle,  or  Pacuvius,  or  Bossu, 
or  Ricaboni  say — though  I  never  read  one  of  them."  And 
(bk.  iii.  chap,  xii.) :  "And  how  did  Garrick  speak  the  solil- 
oquy last  night?  —  Oh,  against  all  rule,  my  lord  —  most 
ungrammatically  !  between  the  substantive  and  the  adjec- 
tive, which  should  agree  together  in  number,  case,  and 
gender,  he  made  a  breach  thus — stopping,  as  if  the  point 
wanted  settling  ;  and  betwixt  the  nominative  case,  which 
your  lordship  knows  should  govern  the  verb,  he  suspended 
his  voice  in  the  epilogue  a  dozen  times,  three  seconds  and 
three-fifths  by  a  stop-watch,  my  lord,  each  time. — Admir- 
able grammarian  !  But  in  suspending  his  voice — was  the 
sense  suspended  likewise  ?  Did  no  expression  of  attitude 
or  countenance  fill  up  the  chasm?  Was  the  eye  silent? 
Did  you  narrowly  look  ? — I  looked  only  at  the  stop-watch, 
mv  lord. — Excellent  observer  ! 


Englisli  Literature.  359 

"And  what  of  this  new  book  the  whole  world  makes  such 
a  rout  about  ? — Oh  !  'tis  out  of  all  plumb,  my  lord — quite 
an  irregular  thing  !  not  one  of  the  angles  at  the  four  cor- 
ners was  a  right  angle.  I  had  my  rule  and  compasses, 
&c.,  my  lord,  in  ray  pocket. — Excellent  critic  ! 

"And  for  the  epic  poem  your  lordship  bid  me  look  at ; 

— upon  taking  the  length,  breadth,  height,  and  depth  of  it, 

and  trying  them  at  home  upon  an  exact  scale  of  Bossu, 

'tis  out,  my  lord,  in  every  one  of  its  dimensions. — Admira- 

'ble  connoisseur  ! 

"And  did  you  step  in  to  look  at  the  grand  picture  in 
your  way  back  ? — 'Tis  a  melancholy  daub,  my  lord  ;  not 
one  principle  of  the  pyramid  in  any  one  group! — and  what 
a  price  ! — for  there  is  nothing  of  the  colouring  of  Titian, — 
the  expression  of  Rubens, — the  grace  of  Raphael, — the 
purity  of  Domenichino, — the  corregiescity  of  Correggio, — 
the  learning  of  Poussin, — the  airs  of  Guide, — the  taste  of 
the  Carachis, — or  the  grand  contour  of  Angelo — grant  me 
patience,  just  heaven  ! — Of  all  the  cants  which  are  canted 
in  this  canting  world — though  the  cant  of  hypocrites  may 
be  the  worst — the  cant  of  criticism  is  the  most  tormenting! 

"  I  would  go  fifty  miles  on  foot,  for  I  have  not  a  horse 
worth  riding  on,  to  kiss  the  hand  of  that  man  whose  gen- 
erous heart  will  give  up  the  reins  of  his  imagination  into 
his  author's  hands  —  be  pleased  he  knows  not  why,  and 
cares  not  wherefore." 

Is  it  any  wonder  that  half  the  world  despised  him,  es- 
pecially when  he  gave  excuse  for  reasonable  prejudice  by 
superfluous  indecorum  ?  The  outlook  would  have  seemed 
black  if  they  had  for  a  moment  supposed  that  this  novel 
would  ever  become  a  classic. 

The  sermons,  too,  though  they  have  been  praised  by  no 
less  an  authority  than  Mr.  Gladstone,  enable  us  to  under- 
stand how  Methodism  made  its  way  in  England  amid  the 


360  English  Literature. 

general  frivolity  of  the  Established  Church.  As  Gray  said 
of  them,  "  You  often  see  him  tottering  on  the  verge  of 
laughter,  and  ready  to  throw  his  periwig  in  the  face  of 
the  audience."  Thus  when  he  had  given  out  his  text 
(Ecclesiastes  vii.  2,  3),  "It  is  better  to  go  to  the  house 
of  mourning,  than  to  go  to  the  house  of  feasting,"  he  be- 
gan, "  That  I  deny.  But  let  us  hear  the  wise  man's  reason- 
ing upon  it.  '  Sorrow  is  better  than  laughter,'  for  a 
cracked  -  brain  order  of  Carthusian  monks,  I  grant  ;  but 
not  for  men  of  the  world."  Or  this:  "The  way  the  world 
usually  judges  is  to  sum  up  the  good  and  bad  against  each 
other,  deduct  the  lesser  of  these  articles  from  the  greater, 
and  (as  we  do  in  passing  other  accounts)  give  credit  to 
the  man  for  w^hat  remains  upon  the  balance."  Often,  too, 
reputations  are  "  sent  out  of  the  world  by  distant  hints, 
nodded  away  and  cruelly  winked  into  suspicion."  Is  it 
surprising  that  they  were  entitled  the  sermons  of  Mr. 
Yorick,  published  by  Mr.  Sterne  ?  Dr.  Johnson  once  owned 
that  he  had  read  them,  "  but,"  he  said,  "  it  was  in  a  stage- 
coach ;  I  should  not  even  have  deigned  to  have  looked 
at  them  had  I  been  at  large  ;"  and  he  said  at  another  time, 
in  Sherlock,  and  Tillotson,  and  Beveridge,  "  you  drink  the 
cup  of  salvation  to  the  bottom ;  here,  you  have  merely 
the  froth  from  the  surface."  Certainly,  when  Sterne 
preached  in  Paris,  to  the  leading  unbelievers  of  the  place, 
he  was  in  more  congenial  company  than  he  could  have 
been  in  at  home  ;  and  we  are  told  that  once  he  preached 
by  invitation  before  the  English  ambassador  there,  and,  as 
Stapfer  says,  this  gave  his  friends,  Ilolbach,  Diderot,  David 
Hume,  Wilkes,  etc.,  a  chance  to  go  for  once  in  their  lives 
into  a  church. 

Yet  Sterne's  facetious  remarks  on  religion  are  scarcely 
further  removed  from  the  great  awakening  that  was  about 
to  pass  over  the  religious  sentiments  of  the  English  peo- 


English  Literature.  361 

pie  than  were  his  literary  innovations  from  the  serious 
change  tliat  was  even  then  giving  signs  of  its  approach. 
Yet,  as  we  have  seen,  even  he  was  helping  the  work  ;  he 
was  breaking  through  the  rigid  chains  of  conventionality, 
laughing  at  formal  rules,  and  showing  the  pathetic  side 
of  life.  But,  clever  as  his  work  was,  it  belonged  essen- 
tially to  the  ante-revolutionary  period,  that  curious  time 
when  every  one's  attention  was  turned  to  solving  by  gen- 
tle measures  the  questions  which  stirred  the  world  at  the 
end  of  the  last  century.  Yet  it  is  with  gentleness  that 
such  things  begin,  and  in  ridiculing  the  pedantry  that 
marked  his  contemporaries  Sterne  was  doing  good  work. 
When,  in  his  "  Sentimental  Journey,"  he  turned  away  from 
all  the  statistics  that  made  up  the  books  of  travels  written 
by  his  predecessors,  and  wrote  not  about  old  churches, 
and  views  and  picture-galleries,  he  was  judging  many  of 
the  volumes  wdiich  were  written  in  the  last  century  and 
are  reprinted,  for  that  matter,  with  new  names  on  the 
title-page,  every  year  of  the  present.  Addison,  for  in- 
stance, visited  Italy,  apparently  to  verify  the  descriptions 
written  by  the  Latin  poets,  and  Sterne  was  anxious  to 
show  that  what  the  traveller  saw  depended  much  more  on 
his  own  whims  than  on  the  geography  of  the  place.  It 
was,  in  short,  what  it  is  defined  to  be  by  the  title. 

Yet  we  feel  that  Sterne  was  wholly  unaware  of  the  mag- 
nitude of  the  change  that  was  impending.  He  lived  at  a 
time  when  society  in  France  and  England  was,  so  to 
speak,  dancing  on  the  edge  of  a  volcano  ;  but  few  ima- 
gined what  disturbances  were  about  to  break  forth.  But 
to  ask  political  wisdom,  which  was  denied  even  to  political 
students,  of  the  novelist,  is  going  out  of  our  way  to  find 
fault.  It  is  enough  that  Sterne  has  added  at  least  one 
figure  to  the  few  immortals  of  fiction,  and  to  have  done 
this  inclines  one  to  overlook  his  many  and  obvious  errors. 

16 


362  English  Literature. 

"VThat  Sterne  possessed  to  a  greater  exten-t  than  any  other 
English  writer  was  the  combination  of  qu-alities  that  in  a 
Frenchman  we  call  Tesprit  gmdois.  There  is  a  sort  of  in- 
tellectual kinship  between  him  and  La  Fontaine,  for  in- 
stance, which  may  to  some  extent  explain  the  English- 
man's popularity  in  France.  The  resemblance  does  not 
consist  in  what  those  who  do  not  like  him  call  his  ribaldry, 
alone,  but  quite  as  much,  or  more,  in  his  way  of  being 
serious,  as  in  the  less  facetious  parts  of  the  "  Sentimental 
Journey."  Stapfer,  in  his  excellent  life  of  Sterne,  brings 
out  Sterne's  seriousness  very  clearly.  The  John  Hall 
Stevenson  who  in  his  worthless  "  Crazy  Tales "  tried  to 
assume  a  Gallic  wit  and  grace,  showed  himself  merely 
a  degraded  Englishman.  Sterne's  sins  brought  violent 
retribution  ;  his  books  he  made  iinreadable  for  half  the 
English-speaking  race,  and  for  the  half  that  reads  most. 
Moreover,  his  minor  faults  were  easily  and  freely  copied. 
Continuations  of  the  "Sentimental  Journey"  abounded. 
Spurious  "  Letters  to  Eliza  and  from  Eliza  "  were  printed. 
Writers  imitated  his  digressions  and  typographical  freaks. 
Diderot  honored  him  by  clever  imitation,  and  sentimen- 
talism  became  one  of  the  vices  of  the  time.  "Whereas 
even  Sterne's  sentiment  was  often  forced,  that  of  his  imi- 
tators became  unbearable;  he  was  ruined  by  his  friends. 

II.  It  is  curious  to  observe  a  more  fruitful  inspiration 
which  offered  itself  to  novel-writers.  Sterne  brought  to 
its  climax  one  of  the  prevailing  forces  of  his  day,  and  after 
him  we  find  but  feeble  attempts  to  produce  the  same  notes. 
Fiction,  or  at  least  the  most  successful  fiction,  moved  in 
a  different  channel.  The  first  to  lead  the  way  being 
Horace  Walpole,  of  all  men,  in  his  "  Castle  of  Otranto." 
This  story  fills  one  of  the  conditions  to  be  found  in  al- 
most every  form  of  Avriting  that  leaves  its  mark  ;  its  main 
merit  is  its  novelty  ;  it  is  itself  commonplace  and  nearly 


lingUs/i  Literature.  363 

unrenrlahle.*  It  was  an  attempt  to  revive  what  was  called 
the  Gothic  I'omance — Walpole  called  it  a  Gothic  story — 
with  such  modifications  as  should  serve  to  make  the  book 
read  like  a  true  narration.  He  said  :  "  That  great  master 
of  nature,  Shakspere,  was  the  model  I  copied." 

We  have  seen  how  the  whole  movement  in  art  and 
literature  ever  since  the  Renaissance  had  been  directed 
against  the  Middle  Ages  ;  how  that  period  had  been  re- 
garded as  one  of  barbarism,  every  trace  of  which  had  to 
be  eradicated  from  the  human  mind  ;  how  Gothic  archi- 
tecture was  derided,  and  the  classic  and  pseudo  -  classic 
admired  ;  how  rigidly  writers  followed  the  steady  light 
of  modern  thoxight,  which  aimed  to  clear  away  supersti- 
tion and  to  substitute  reason.  The  work  seemed  at  length 
done  ;  in  France,  religion  was  deposed,  and  even  in  Eng- 
land it  was  unfashionable,  as  we  saw  when  we  examined 
Sterne's  shandyisms  in  the  pulpit — yet  at  the  very  moment 
the  work  seemed  accomplished  men's  minds  returned  with 
curiosity  towards  what  they  had  just  learned  to  reject,  ex- 
actly as  at  the  point  of  noon,  when  all  is  brightest,  the  sun, 
that  has  been  climbing  the  heavens  since  dawn,  begins  to 
decline  towards  setting.  Mr.  Leslie  Stephen  is  right  when 
he  says  that  thought  moves  in  a  spiral  cuiwe.  Yet  in 
literature  the  night  that  was  approaching  was  not  the  one 
that  had  been  left  behind  ;  that  was  a  dark  one,  this  one 
was  lit  up  by  a  perpetual  full  moon. 

We  shall  soon  return  to  studying  the  way  in  which  the 
change  gradually  made  its  way  in  poetry.     In  fiction  the 

*  The  story  is  so  silly  that  some  have  thought  it  was  a  burlesque — but 
a  burlesque  of  what '?  There  was  in  existence  no  original  to  laugh  at.  A 
book  that  is  good  of  its  kind  proves  the  existence  of  a  line  of  predecessors ; 
unfortunately,  poor  books  may  be  written  at  any  time,  but  the  faults  of 
the  "  Castle  of  Otranto  "  are  those  of  a  beginner.  Compare  it  in  this  re- 
spect with  "George  Barnwell." 


364  Encjllsh  Literature. 

plunge  was  taken  almost  without  any  apparent  sympathy 
with  that  slow  but  wide  -  spread  movement.  Walpole 
sniffed  at  everything  and  everybody,  and  he  must  have 
been  much  laughed  at  for  his  affectations.  \ye  have  seen 
how  Pope  ridiculed  in  his  "  Dunciad  "  the  people  who  in- 
terested themselves  in  investigations  of  the  past.  They 
were  looked  upon  as  would  be  men  nowadays  who  should 
try  experiments  in  tattooing  themselves,  but  Walpole  was 
a  good  deal  of  an  antiquary.  To  be  sure,  his  taste  was 
uncertain  :  Spenser  he  thought  wretched  stuff,  and  the 
"Midsummer-Night's  Dream,"  "forty  times  more  non- 
sensical than  the  worst  translation  of  any  Italian  opera- 
books"  (Horace  Walpole  to  Bentley,  Feb.  23,  1755).  Al- 
thouo-h  this  view  of  Shakspere  he  afterwards  modified  a 
little  when,  in  his  preface  to  the  "  Castle  of  Otranto  "  (2d 
ed.),  after  the  passage  quoted,  in  which  he  said  that  he 
had  taken  Shakspere  for  his  model,  he  goes  on  :  "  Let 
me  ask  if  his  tragedies  of  'Hamlet'  and  'Julius  Cfesar ' 
would  not  lose  a  considerable  share  of  their  spirit  and 
wonderful  beauties  if  the  humour  of  the  gravediggers, 
the  fooleries  of  Polonius,  and  the  clumsy  jests  of  the  Ro- 
man citizens  were  omitted  or  vested  in  heroics  ?  Is  not 
the  eloquence  of  Antony,  the  nobler  and  affectedly-un- 
affected oration  of  Brutus,  artificially  exalted  by  the  rude 
bursts  of  nature  from  the  mouths  of  their  auditors  ?  These 
touches  remind  one  of  the  Grecian  sculptor,  who,  to  con- 
vey the  idea  of  a  Colossus  within  the  dimensions  of  a 
seal,  inserted  a  little  boy  measuring  his  thumb.  No,  says 
"Voltaire,  in  his  edition  of  '  Corneille,'  this  mixture  of 
buffoonery,  and  solemnity  is  intolerable."  When  Vol- 
taire defended  his  criticism,  Walpole  swallowed  his  words 
with  great  politeness,  saying  that  when  Shakspere  lived 
"there  had  not  l)eon  a  Voltaire  both  to  give  laws  to  the 
stage,  and  to  show  on  what  good  sense  tlioso  laws  were 


English  Literature.  365 

founded.  Your  art,  Sir,  goes  still  further ;  for  you  have 
suj^ported  your  arguments  without  having  recourse  to 
the  best  authority,  your  own  works.  It  was  my  inter- 
est, perhaps,  to  defend  barbarism  and  irregularity,"  etc. 
There  could  be,  however,  no  greater  waste  of  time  than 
trying  to  find  out  Walpole's  real  opinions,  for  they  are 
carefully  hidden,  and  when  found  are  worthless.  He  tned 
to  pin  himself  to  Shakspere's  skirts,  or,  as  he  put  it,  "  to 
shelter  [his]  own  daring  under  the  canon  of  the  brightest 
genius  this  countr}^,  at  least,  has  produced."  He  claims 
credit  in  the  next  line  for  "  having  created  a  new  species 
of  romance,"  and  his  boast  was  well  founded. 

I  have  said  he  was  an  antiquarian.  In  IV^V  he  bought 
his  famous  place.  Strawberry  Hill,  which  he  turned  into  a 
pasteboard  Gothic  castle.  He  was  said  "  to  have  outlived 
three  sets  of  his  own  battlements,"  in  a  "  little  parlour 
hung  with  a  stone-colour  Gothic  paper,  and  Jackson's  Ve- 
netian prints,"  or  "  in  the  room  where  we  always  live, 
hung  with  a  blue  and  white  paper  in  stripes,  adorned  with 
festoons."  It  would  be  easy  to  laugh  at  Walpole's  notions 
of  the  Gothic  and  of  house-decoration  ;  crocodile's  tears 
could  readily  flow  over  the  insincerity  of  the  attempts  at 
restoration — for  that  matter,  even  Sir  Walter  Scott  had 
stucco  and  sham  carving  at  Abbotsford  as  well  as  in  his 
novels — yet  Walpole  had  a  room  full  of  Holbeins  and  a 
number  of  genuine  curiosities.  What  was  singular  was 
that  he  possessed  this  rare  taste  at  all,  not  that  he  did  not 
possess  it  as  modified  by  a  century  of  dilettanteism.*     If 

*  According  to  Eastlake  {vide  his  "Gothic  Revival"),  the  love  of  Gothic 
architecture  had  never  quite  died  out  in  England.  See  also  World,  No.  12, 
March,  1753:  "A  few  years  ago,  ever^ything  was  Gothic;  our  houses,  our 
beds,  our  bookcases,  and  our  couches,  were  all  copied  from  some  parts  or 
other  of  our  old  cathedrals.  The  Grecian  architecture  .  .  .  which  was 
taught  by  nature  and  polished  by  the  graces,  was  totally  neglected.  . . .  This, 


366  Englhh  Literature. 

there  was  the  sham  Gothic  in  his  house,  there  was  also 
much  in  his  novel,  and  where  our  grandfathers  shuddered 
we  yawn ;  what  kept  them  awake  puts  us  to  sleep.     It 

however  odd  it  might  seem,  and  however  unworthy  of  the  name  of  Taste, 
was  cultivated  and  was  admired  and  still  has  its  professors  in  different 
parts  of  England." 

Eastlake  (id  supra,  p.  52)  mentions  "  Gothic  Architecture  improved  by 
Rules  and  Proportions  in  many  Grand  Designs  of  Columns,  Doors,  Win- 
dows, Chimney-pieces,  Arcades,  Colonades,  Porticos,  Umbrellos,  Temples, 
and  Pavilions,  etc.,  with  Plans,  Elevations,  and  Profiles ;  geometrically  ex- 
plained by  B.  and  T.  Langley  "  (London:  1742).  He  calls  it  a  foolish 
book. 

The  weight  of  evidence  goes  to  show  that  whatever  love  of  the  Gothic 
existed  was  outside  of  the  polished  circles,  more  of  whose  opinions  have 
reached  us.  Even  Gray,  when  he  went  on  the  Continent  in  1739,  with 
Horace  Walpole,  speaks  of  the  Cathedral  at  Amiens  as  simply  a  "  huge 
Gothic  building,  beset  on  the  outside  with  thousands  of  small  statues," 
and  of  that  at  Sienna  as  "  a  huge  pile  of  marble,  laboured  with  a  Gothic 
niceness  and  delicacy  in  the  old-fashioned  way."  But  Defoe,  in  his  "  Tour 
through  Britain"  (4th  ed.  1748), praises  Gothic  architecture  (e.  ^.,  iii.  106): 
"Another  thing  worthy  of  Notice  in  this  Neighbourhood  is  the  Tower  and 
Spire  of  the  Church  of  Laiiyhton,  which  for  Delicacy  and  Justness  of  Pro- 
portion, is  not  excelled  by  any  other  Gothic  Piece  of  the  kind."  See  also 
his  account  of  York  Catliedral,  and,  indeed,  passim. 

See,  too,  "  Tom  Jones  "  (1749).  "  The  Gothic  style  of  architecture  could 
produce  nothing  nobler  than  Mr.  AUworthy's  house.  There  was  an  air  of 
grandeur  in  it  tliat  struck  you  with  awe,  and  rivalled  the  beauties  of  the 
best  Grecian  architecture ;  and  it  was  as  commodious  within  as  it  was 
venerable  without.  .  .  .  Beyond  this  [the  park]  the  country  gradually  rose 
into  a  ridge  of  wild  mountains,  the  tops  of  which  were  above  the  clouds." 
Consequently,  Sir  William  Chambers  must  have  found  some  people  ready 
to  receive  these  views:  "To  those  usually  called  Gothic  architects  we  are 
indebted  for  the  first  considerable  improvements  in  construction ;  there  is 
a  lightness  in  their  works,  an  art  and  boldness  of  execution  to  w'hich  the 
ancients  never  arrived,  and  which  the  moderns  comprehend  and  imitate 
with  difficulty.  .  .  .  One  cannot  refrain  from  wishing  that  the  Gothic 
structures  were  more  considered,  better  understood,  and  in  higher  estima- 
tion than  thov  hitherto  seem  to  have  been.     Would  our  dilettanti,  instead 


English  Literature.  367 

is  useless  to  be  too  sincere  and  to  give  the  whole  plot  of 
this  obsolete  novel,  in  1765,  I  shall  mention  but  a  few  of 
the  most  characteristic  of  its  qualities.  Take  the  open- 
ing horror  :  the  tyrant,  Manfred,  Prince  of  Otranto,  is 
about  to  marry  his  son  Conrad,  a  boy  of  fifteen,  '^  a  home- 
ly youth,  sickly,  and  of  no  promising  disposition,"  to  Isa- 
bella, daughter  of  the  Marquis  of  Yicenza  ;  the  day  is  ap- 
pointed, the  guests  are  assembled,  but  Conrad  is  missed. 
An  attendant  is  ordered  to  fetch  him.  In  a  moment,  he 
"  came  running  back,  breathless,  in  a  frantic  manner,  his 
eyes  staring,  and  foaming  at  the  mouth."  His  first  words 
are  "  Oh  !  the  helmet !  the  helmet !"  His  emotion  is  par- 
donable, for,  on  investigation,  "  what  a  sight  for  a  father's 
eyes  !  he  beheld  his  child  dashed  to  pieces,  and  almost 
buried  under  an  enormous  helmet,  a  hundred  times  more 
large  than  any  casque  ever  made  for  human  being,  and 
shaded  with  a  proportionable  quantity  of  black  feathers." 
This  incident  was  suggested  to  Walpole  by  a  dream,  and 
it  is  not  the  last  time  that  what  has  seemed  terrible  to  the 
dreamer  has  not  appalled  those  to  whom  it  has  been  told. 
Besides  this  monstrous  helmet,  there  is  a  monstrous 
sword,  borne  by  one  hundred  gentlemen,  who  seemed  to 
faint  under  the  weight  of  it.  More  than  this,  the  limbs 
of  a  giant  haunt  the  castle  :  one  man  saw  his  foot  and 
part  of  his  leg  in  one  room  ;  another  time,  one  of  the 
servants  saw,  or  said  she  saw,  "  upon  the  uppermost  ban- 

of  importing  the  gleanings  of  Greece,  or  our  antiquarians,  instead  of  pub- 
lishing loose  incoherent  prints,  encourage  persons  duly  qualified  to  under- 
take a  correct  elegant  publication  of  our  own  cathedrals  and  other  build- 
ings called  Gothic,  before  they  totally  fall  to  ruin,  it  would  be  of  real 
service  to  the  arts  of  design,  preserve  the  remembrance  of  an  extraordi- 
nary style  of  building  now  sinking  fast  into  oblivion,  and  at  the  same  time 
publish  to  the  world  the  riches  of  Britain  in  the  splendour  of  her  ancient 
structures"  ("  Treatise  of  Architecture,"  HoG,  p.  128). 


368  EnyliisJi  LiUrature. 

nister  of  the  great  stairs  a  hand  in  armour,  as  big,  as 
big — I  thought  I  should  have  swooned."  This  giant  who 
made  his  appearance  in  serial  form,  in  fragments  like  the 
statue  that  is  to  adorn  Governor's  Island  in  New  York 
harbor,  is  not  the  only  thing  that  is  terrible.  The  statue 
of  Alfonso  takes  part  in  the  domestic  strife,  and  when 
Manfred — whose  bad  temper,  be  it  said  by  the  way,  is  a 
good  match  for  the  bulk  of  the  giant — says,  " '  Frederick 
accepts  Matilda's  hand,  and  is  content  to  waive  his  claim, 
unless  I  have  no  male  issue ' — as  he  spoke  these  words," 
the  incredible  happened  —  "three  drops  of  blood  fell 
from  the  nose  of  Alfonso's  statue  !"  By  the  side  of  this, , 
a  portrait  that  descends  from  its  frame,  sighs,  Avalks  along 
the  floor  with  a  grave  and  melancholy  air,  and  out  of  the 
door,  which  it  shuts  behind  it  with  violence — is  a  mere 
eveiy-day  occurrence.  The  story  is  certainly  ridiculous 
enough,  and  the  plot,  with  its  numerous  complications, 
is  well  adapted  to  its  setting.  The  heroine  flees  through 
secret  passages,  heroes  pop  out  from  behind  the  doors, 
sti'ange  claps  of  thunder  are  heard,  which  kei)t  muttering 
for  half  a  century  ;  and  when  Matilda  interrupted  the  art- 
less prattle  of  her  maid  Bianca,  who  was  talking  naturally, 
after  the  manner, Walpole  thought,  of  Shakspere's  serving- 
people,  "  '  I  do  not  wish  to  see  you  moped  in  a  convent, 
as  you  would  be  if  you  had  your  will,  and  if  my  lady, 
your  mother,  who  knows  that  a  bad  husband  is  better 
than  no  husband  at  all,  did  not  hinder  you — Bless  me  ! 
what  noise  is  that  ?  St.  Nicholas  forgive  me  !  I  was  but 
in  jest.' — '  It  is  the  wind,'  said  JNIatilda, '  whistling  through 
the  battlements  of  the  tower  above  ;  you  have  heard  it  a 
thousand  times,' " — Avhen  Matilda  said  that,  she  did  not 
know  it  Avould  ])e  heard  many  thousand  times  again  whist- 
ling about  the  battlements  in  Scott's  novels  and  Byron's 
poems.     And    as  for   the  moon,  it  has  scarcely   set  yet. 


English  Literature.  369 

"  The  lower  part  of  the  castle  was  hollowed  into  several 
intricate  cloisters  ;  and  it  was  not  easy  for  one,  under  so 
much  anxiety,  to  find  the  door  that  opened  into  the  cavern. 
An  awful  silence  reigned  throughout  those  subterraneous 
regions,  except  now  and  then  some  blasts  of  wind  that 
shook  the  doors  she  had  passed,  and  which,  grating  on  the 
rusty  hinges,  were  re-echoed  through  that  long  labyrinth 
of  darkness.  Every  murmur  struck  her  with  new  terror." 
Having  found  the  door,  she  entered  the  vault,  and  "  it 
gave  her  a  kind  of  momentary  joy  to  perceive  an  im- 
perfect ray  of  clouded  moonshine  gleam  from  the  roof  of 
the  vault."  In  a  few  minutes,  while  she  is  talking  with  a 
youth  who  is  helping  her  look  for  the  lock  to  the  hidden 
passage,  "  a  ray  of  moonshine,  streaming  through  a  cranny 
of  the  ruin  above,  shone  directly  on  the  lock  they  sought." 
A  few  moments  before,  the  moon  had  been  of  service, 
for  "  Manfred  rose  to  pursue  her,  when  the  moon,  which 
was  now  up,  and  gleamed  in  at  the  opposite  casement, 
presented  to  his  sight  the  plumes  of  the  fatal  helmet, 
which  rose  to  the  height  of  the  windows,  waving  back- 
wards and  forwards  in  a  tempestuous  manner,  and  accom- 
panied with  a  hollow  and  a  rustling  sound."  And  later, 
"  Gliding  softly  between  the  aisles,  and  guided  by  an  im- 
perfect gleam  of  moonshine  that  shone  faintly  through 
the  illuminated  windows,  he  stole  towards  the  tomb  of 
Alfonso,"  and  slew  his  daughter,  mistaking  her  for  Isa- 
bella. Certainly  Byron's  Manfred  got  something  more 
than  his  name  from  this  domestic  tyrant,  and  the  poets  of 
the  romantic  school  were  indebted  for  more  than  moon- 
light and  roaring  wind  to  this  curious  story.  Here,  for 
example,  is  Bianca's  sketch  of  the  hero  who  triumphed  so 
long  in  poetry,  and  has  now  sunk  to  the  New  York  Ledger 
and  the  covers  of  prune-boxes  :  "  '  But  come,  madam,  sup- 
pose, to-morrow  morning,  he  [your  father]  was  to  send  for 

16* 


370  English  Literature. 

you  to  the  great  council  chamber,  and  there  you  should 
find,  at  his  elbow,  a  lovely  young  pi'ince,  with  large  black 
eyes,  a  smooth  white  forehead,  and  manly  curling  locks 
like  jet ;  in  short,  madam,  a  young  hero,  resembling  the 
picture  of  the  good  Alfonso  in  the  gallery,  which  you  sit 
and  gaze  at  for  hours  together.' — '  Do  not  speak  lightly 
of  that  picture,'  interrupted  Matilda,  sighing  :  '  I  know 
the  adoration  with  which  I  look  at  that  picture  is  uncom- 
mon— but  I  am  not  in  love  with  a  coloured  pannel.  The 
character  of  that  virtuous  prince,  the  veneration  with 
which  my  mother  has  inspired  me  for  his  memory,  the 
orisons  which,  I  know  not  why,  she  has  enjoined  me  to 
pour  forth  at  his  tomb,  all  have  concurred  to  persuade  me 
that,  somehow  or  other,  my  destiny  is  linked  with  some- 
thing relating  to  him,' "  etc.  Notice  another  novelty,  where 
Matilda,  who,  by  a  cui'ious  coincidence,  spoke  the  truth 
in  those  last  words,  was  killed,  "  Frederick  offered  his 
daughter  to  the  new  prince,  which  Hippolita's  tenderness 
for  Isabella  concurred  to  promote  ;  but  Theodore's  grief 
was  too  fresh  to  admit  the  thought  of  another  love  ;  and 
it  was  not  until  after  frequent  discourses  with  Isabella  of 
his  dear  Matilda  that  he  was  persuaded  he  could  know 
no  happiness  but  in  the  society  of  one  with  whom  he 
could  for  ever  indulge  the  melancholy  that  had  taken 
possession  of  his  soul."  There  had  been  melancholy  be- 
fore this,  just  as  there  had  been  moonlight,  but  enchant- 
ing gloom  was  now  about  to  sweep  over  the  world.  Let 
us  see  what  other  indications  there  were  of  the  change  in 
men's  feelings. 

III.  A  complete  examination  of  all  the  poets  of  the 
last  century  would  be  immeasurably  tedious,  and  Avithout 
going  into  long  analyses  of  these  writings  we  will  examine 
them  simply  to  discover  such  traces  as  there  may  be  of 
what  afterwards  developed  into  genuine  poetry.     One  of 


English  Literature.  371 

the  first  evidences  of  a  desire  for  something  different 
from  the  regular  couplet,  which  Pope  had  brought  to  such 
perfection,  was  the  frequent  use  of  blank  verse.  It  was 
doubtless  the  edition  of  Milton,  in  1688,  that  suggested 
this  form  ;  or,  at  any  rate,  it  confirmed  them  in  their  choice. 
In  his  edition  of  Spenser  (London  :  Tonson,  1715,3  vols.),* 
John  Hughes  wrote  ("  Dedication  to  Lord  Sommers,"  v.)  : 
"  It  Avas  your  Lordship's  encouraging  a  beautiful  edition 
of  '  Paradise  Lost '  that  first  brought  that  incomparable 
poem  to  be  generally  known  and  esteemed."  We  have 
seen  John  Phillips's  "  Cyder,"  written,  it  was  supposed, 
in  the  Miltonic  manner,  but  it  was  also  in  more  serious 
writing  that  this  form  was  used.  It  would  be  rash,  or  at 
any  rate  unkind,  to  assert  that  Dr.  Young,  in  his  "  Night 

*  Chaucer  had  been  less  neglected  than  Spenser,  as  is  readily  shown. 
Editions  of  Chaucer:  Caxton's,  14Y5-6, and  a  second  six  years  later,  1532, 
1542,  1546,  1555,  1561,  1597,  1602;  reprinted,  1687,  1721;  volume  con- 
taining  "Prologue"  and  "Knight's  Tale,"  1737;  and  Tyrwhitt's,  1775- 
78;  2d  ed.  1798. 

Thomas  Wilson,  in  his  "Arte  of  Rhetoiike"  (1553),  quoted  by  Warton, 
says :  "  The  fine  courtier  will  talk  nothing  but  Chaucer." 

Topsel's  "History  of  Four-footed  Beasts  and  Serpents"  (1658)  quotes 
Chaucer's  description  of  the  Franklin. 

Denham,  in  his  poem  on  Cowley's  death,  speaks  of  "  Old  Chaucer." 

In  the  Idler,  No.  49,  "  On  the  third  day  uprose  the  sun  and  Mr.  Marvel." 

Chaucer's  "Tales,"  London,  1665;  and  "  Troilus  and  Cresslda"  in  Latin, 
by  Fr.  Kynaston,  Oxon.  1635. 

This  attempt  to  revive  an  interest  in  Spenser  apparently  met  with  little 
success.  Dr.  Johnson,  in  his  life  of  Hughes  :  "He  did  not  much  revive  the 
curiosity  of  the  public;  for  near  thirty  years  elapsed  before  his  edition 
■was  reprinted."  The  Glossary  contained  the  following  words,  now  suffi- 
ciently familiar  :  aghast,  appal,  atween,  ay  (ever),  baleful,  bay  (bark),  be- 
dight,  behest,  boot,  bootless,  bourn  (torrent),  buxom  (yielding),  canon  (a 
rule),  cark,  carol,  certes,  checkmate,  cheer,  n.,  chivalry,  complot,  cleped, 
con,  cotes,  couth,  craven,  credence,  distraught,  dole,  doff,  don,  doughty, 
dreary,  eftsoons,  eld,  elfs,  elfin,  embossed,  ensample,  eyne,  forlorn,  fon'v. 


372  English  Literatiipe. 

Thoughts,"  tried  to  imitate  Milton  in  his  blank  verse. 
He  had  written  several  satires  in  the  form  that  Pope  used, 
and  these  are  perhaps  worth  brief  examination.  Thus 
(sat.  iii.),  "Love  of  Fame  a  Universal  Passion  :" 

"  To  show  the  strength  and  infamy  of  pride, 
By  all  'tis  followed  and  by  all  deny'd, 
What  numbers  are  there,  which  at  once  pursue 
Praise,  and  the  glory  to  contemn  it,  too  ? 
Vincenna  knows  self-praise  betrays  to  shame, 
And  therefore  lays  a  strategem  for  fame ; 
Makes  his  approach  in  modesty's  disguise, 
To  win  applause ;  and  takes  it  by  surprise. 
'  To  err,'  says  he,  '  in  small  things  is  my  fate,' 
You  know  your  answer,  '  he's  exact  in  great.' 
'  My  style,'  says  he,  '  is  rude  and  full  of  faults,' 
'  But,  oh  !  what  sense !  what  energy  of  thoughts  1' 
That  he  wants  Algebra  he  must  confess ; 
'  But  not  a  soul  to  give  our  arms  success.' 
'Ah  !     That's  a  hit  indeed,'  Vincenna  cries; 
'But  who  in  heat  of  blood  is  ever  wise  ? 
I  own  'twas  wrong,  when  thousands  called  me  back, 
To  make  that  hopeless,  ill-advis'd  attack ; 
All  say,  'twas  madness  ;  nor  dare  I  deny  ; 
Sure  never  fool  so  well  descrv'd  to  die,' "  etc. 

Plis  lyric  flights  were  less  successful ;  thus,  in  "  Ocean  : 
an  Ode"  (1727),  he  says: 

gear,  glee,  guerdon,  guileful,  guise,  hie,  hight,  hoar,  ire,  kirtle,  lief,  leman, 
levin,  plight,  welkin,  well,  v.,  whilom,  wend,  wise,  n.,  yore.  Many  of  the 
above  and  the  following  are  taken  from  Percy's  "  Reliqucs :"  ban,  beshewn, 
blent  (blended),  boon,  bugle  (horn),  churl,  dank,  dell,  den,  doublet,  foregoe, 
glen,  gloze,  leech,  meed,  mishap,  moor,  peril,  quean,  scant,  troth,  tush,  unc- 
tuous, unkempt,  wax,  v.  The  Glossary  to  Thomson's  "  Castle  of  Indolence  " 
contains  also  the  following,  as  well  as  some  of  those  just  quoted  :  bale, 
blazon,  cates,  deftly,  eke,  fain,  lea,  moil,  nathless,  palmer,  prankt,  ruth, 
scar,  shun,  smackt,  sooth,  thrall,  ween,  whenas,  wot,  etc.  Other  words  in 
the  Glossary  to  Percy  are :  astound,  aureat,  caytiffe,  check  (stop),  dint, 
erst,  and  trim  (exact). 


English  Literature.  373 

"  The  stars  are  bright 

To  cheer  the  night, 
And  shed,  through  shadows,  temper'd  fire ; 

And  Phoebus  flames 

With  burnlsli'd  beams, 
Which  some  adore,  and  all  admire. 

Are  then  the  seas 

Outshone  by  these  ? 
Bright  Thetis  !  thou  art  not  outshone  ; 

With  kinder  beams, 

And  softer  gleams, 
Thy  bosom  wears  them  as  thy  own. 
m  ^(  *  *  * 

Those  clouds,  whose  dyes 

Adorn  the  skies, 
That  silver  snow,  that  pearly  rain ; 

Has  Phoebus  stole 

To  grace  the  pole, 
The  plunder  of  th'  iuvaded  main ! 

The  gaudy  bow. 

Whose  colours  glow. 
Whose  arch  with  so  much  skill  is  bent. 

To  Plioebus'  ray. 

Which  paints  so  gay. 
By  thee  the  watery  woof  is  lent,"  etc. 

Then  there  was  "The  Last  Day"  (1713),  a  subject  that 
our  grandfathers  were  fond  of  treating,  as  Dryden's  lines 
about  it  show.     Young  does  but  little  better — 

"  Now  man  awakes,  and  from  his  silent  bed. 
Where  he  has  slept  for  ages,  lifts  his  head ; 
Shakes  off  the  slumber  of  ten  thousand  years, 
And  on  the  borders  of  new  worlds  appears. 
Whate'er  the  bold,  the  rash  adventure  cost. 
In  wide  eternity  I  dare  be  lost. 
The  Muse  is  wont  in  narrow  bounds  to  sing, 
To  teach  the  swain,  or  celebrate  the  king. 
I  grasp  the  whole,  no  more  to  parts  confined, 
I  lift  my  voice  and  sing  to  human  kind. 


374  English  Literature. 

I  sing  to  men  and  angels  ;  angels  join, 

While  such  the  theme,  their  sacred  songs  with  mine. 

****** 
Now  monuments  prove  faithful  to  their  trust, 
And  render  back  their  long-committed  dust. 
Now  charnels  rattle ;  scattered  limbs  and  all 
The  various  bones,  obsequious  to  the  call, 
Self-moved,  advance  ;  the  neck  perhaps  to  meet 
The  distant  head,  the  distant  legs  the  feet. 
Dreadful  to  view,  see  through  the  dusky  sky 
Fragments  of  bodies  in  confusion  fly, 
To  distant  regions  journeying,  there  to  claim 
Deserted  members  and  complete  the  frame. 
The  trumpet's  sound  each  fragrant  mote  shall  hear, 
Or  fix'd  in  earth,  or  if  afloat  in  air, 
Obey  the  signal  wafted  in  the  wind. 
And  not  one  sleeping  atom  lag  behind. 

So  swarming  bees  that  on  a  summer's  day 
In  airy  rings  and  wild  meanders  play, 
Charm'd  with  the  brazen  sound,  their  wanderings  end, 
And  gently  circling  on  a  bough  descend  "  (bk.  ii.  1.  1). 

These  last  lines  refer  to  the  rustic  habit  of  collecting 
bees  by  beating  a  tin  pan  with  a  stick. 

"  How  vast  the  concourse  !  not  in  numbers  more 
The  waves  that  break  on  the  resounding  shore, 
The  leaves  that  tremble  in  the  shady  grove, 
The  lamps  that  gild  the  spangled  vaults  above." 

With  this  passage  may  be  compared  the  lines  in  Field- 
ing's "Tom  Thumb,"  beginning,  "So  have  I  seen." 

He  tried  another  measure,  of  which  this  passage  must 
serve  as  the  only  specimen  : 

"Proud  Venice  sits  amid  the  waves; 

Her  foot  ambitious  ocean  laves : 
Art's  noblest  boast !  but  0  what  wondrous  odds 

'Twixt  Venice  and  Britannia's  isle  ! 

'Twixt  mortal  and  immortal  toil! 
Britannia  is  a  Venice  built  by  gods," 


English  Literature.  375 

Is  it  any  wonder  that  Young  took  to  writing  blank- 
verse?  The  wonder  is,  perhaps,  that  he  was  read.  Yet, 
while  we  cannot  read  him  for  delight,  we  know  that  he 
said  something  that  our  grandfathers  liked  to  hear.  What 
he  uttered  in  his  solemn  way,  no  one  would  care  to  deny. 
He  put  into  somewhat  formal  language,  adorned  with 
much  of  the  crude  ore  of  Romanticism,  the  yearning  of 
his  century  for  morality.  That,  we  saw,  inspired  a  good 
part  of  the  Spectator,  and  it  was  the  main  end  of  the  work 
done  by  most  of  the  writers.  But,  with  respect  be  it 
spoken,  a  century  of  preaching  palls,  and  too  often  the 
undeniable  excellence  of  the  subject  has  blinded  readers 
to  faults  in  the  execution.  One  thing  that  the  poets 
were  never  tired  of  was  the  tomb.  Young  is  forever 
bringing  his  Lorenzo  to  the  edge  of  an  open  grave  and 
bidding  him  look  in. 

"  The  man  how  blest,  who,  sick  of  gaudy  scenes, 
(Scenes  apt  to  thrust  between  us  and  ourselves !) 
Is  led  by  choice  to  take  his  favorite  walk 
Beneath  death's  gloomy,  silent,  cypress  shades, 
Unpierc'd  by  vanity's  fantastic  ray, 
To  read  his  monuments,  to  weigh  his  dust, 
Visit  his  vaults,  and  dwell  among  the  tombs ! 
Lorenzo  !  read  with  me  Narcissa's  stone  ; 
(Narcissa  was  thy  favorite)  let  us  read 
Her  moral  stone  !  few  doctors  preach  so  well ; 
Few  orators  so  tenderly  can  touch 
The  feeling  heart.     What  pathos  in  the  date  !" 

And  this  (Night  ix.): 

"  My  solemn  night-born  adjuration  here : 
»  *  *  *  * 

By  the  long  list  of  swift  mortality, 
From  Adam  downward  to  this  evening  knell, 
Which  midnight  waves  in  fancy's  startled  eye. 
And  shocks  her  with  an  hundred  centuries. 
Round  death's  black  banner  throng'd  in  human  thought ! 


376  English  Literature. 

Bv  thousands  now  resigning  their  last  breath, 

And  calling  thee — wert  thou  so  wise  to  hear ! 

By  tombs  o'er  tombs  arising  ;  human  earth 

Ejected,  to  make  room  for — human  earth ; 

The  monarch's  terror  and  the  sexton's  trade. 

By  pompous  obsequies  that  shun  the  day, 

The  torch  funereal,  and  tlie  nodding  plume, 

Which  makes  poor  man's  humiliation  proud ; 

Boast  of  our  ruin  !  triumph  of  our  dust ! 

By  the  damp  vault  tliat  weeps  o'er  royal  bones, 

And  the  pale  lamp  that  shows  the  ghastly  dead 

More  ghastly,  tlirough  the  thick  incumbent  gloom  ! 

By  the  visits  (if  there  are),  from  darker  scenes. 

The  gliding  spectre !  and  the  groaning  grave  ! 

By  groans  and  graves,  and  miseries  that  groan 

For  the  grave's  shelter  !  by  depending  men. 

Senseless  to  pains  of  death,  from  pangs  of  guilt ! 

By  guilt's  last  audit !  by  yon  moon  in  blood, 

The  rocking  firmament,  the  falling  stars. 

And  thunder's  last  discharge,  great  nature's  knell,"  etc. 

This  is  the  romantic  part  of  the  long  serious  poems, 
which  are  rhetorical  exercises  in  defence  of  morality  and 
orthodoxy.     Lorenzo  is,  for  instance  (Night  ix.),  told  to 

"  Imagine  from  their  deep  foundations  torn 
The  most  gigantic  sons  of  earth,  the  broad 
And  towering  Alps,  all  tost  into  the  sea ; 
And,  light  as  down,  or  volatile  as  air, 
Their  bulks  enormous,  dancing  on  the  waves. 
In  time,  and  measure,  exquisite  ;  while  all 
The  winds,  in  emulation  of  the  spheres, 
Tune  their  sonorous  instruments  aloft. 
The  concert  swell  and  animate  the  ball. 
Would  this  appear  amazing  ?" 

To  til  is  question,  Lorenzo,  who  has  had  to  listen  to  over 
four  thousand  lines  of  declamatory  blank-verse,  apparent- 
ly nods  his  head,  to  signify  that  he  should  feel  surprised 


English  Literature.  Z77 

at  seeing  the  mountains  floating  on  the  top  of  the  sea ; 
and  then  he  is  bidden  to  consider 

"  Worlds  in  a  far  thinner  element  sustained, 
And  acting  the  same  part,  with  greater  skill, 
More  rapid  movement,  and  for  noblest  ends." 

He  has  already  had  immortality  proved  in  what  must 
have  seemed  like  never-ending  strains  (Night  vii.) : 

"  And  can  ambition  a  fourth  proof  supply  ? 
It  can,  and  stronger  than  the  former  three ; 
Though  quite  o'erlook'd  by  some  reputed  wise. 
***** 
"  Man  must  soar. 
An  obstinate  activity  within, 
An  insuppressive  spring,  will  toss  him  up 
In  spite  of  fortune's  load.     Not  kings  alone, 
Each  villager  has  his  ambition  too ; 
No  Sultan  prouder  than  his  fettered  slave : 
Slaves  build  their  little  Babylons  of  straw, 
Echo  the  proud  Assyrian  in  their  hearts, 
And  cry, '  Behold  the  wonders  of  my  might !' 
And  why  ?     Because  immortal  as  their  lord  ; 
And  souls  immortal  must  for  ever  heave 
At  something  great,  the  glitter  or  the  gold, 
The  praise  of  mortals,  or  the  praise  of  heaven." 

This  passage  has  the  quality,  the  same  in  kind,  though 
less  in  degree,  that  we  find  in  the  best  passages  which  are 
familiar  to  us,  as 

"  Tired  Nature's  sweet  restorer,  balmy  sleep ! 
He,  like  the  world,  his  ready  visit  pays 
When  Fortune  smiles  ;  the  wretched  he  forsakes  ; 
Swift  on  his  downy  pinion  flies  from  wo, 
And  lights  on  lids  unsullied  with  a  tear. 

From  short  (as  usual)  and  disturbed  repose 
I  wake  :  how  happy  they  who  wake  no  more ! 
Yet  that  were  vain,  if  dreams  infest  the  grave." 

What  impresses  us  throughout  is  the  rhetorical  quality 


378  English  Literature. 

of  the  verse,  and  this  seems  to  come  directly  from  the 
imitation  of  Latin  poetry,  where  we  find  abnndant  decla- 
mation. As  Mr.  Sellar  says,  in  "  The  Roman  Poets  of  the 
Repnhlic,"  p.  8,  "  They  betray  the  want  of  dramatic  genins 
in  other  fields  of  literature,  especially  in  epic  and  idyllic 
poetry,  and  in  philosophical  dialogues.  Their  poets  give 
utterance  to  vehemence  of  passion,  or  heroism  of  senti- 
ment, either  directly  from  their  own  hearts  and  convic- 
tions, or  in  great  rhetorical  passages,  attributed  to  the 
imaginary  personages  of  the  story — to  Ariadne  or  Dido, 
to  Turnus  or  Mezentius.  But  this  utterance  of  passion 
and  sentiment  is  not  often  united  in  them  with  a  vivid 
delineation  of  the  complex  characters  of  men."  This  ex- 
ample, however,  did  but  give  encouragement  to  the  pre- 
vailing tendency  ;  at  least,  it  is  not  Rome  alone  that  is  to 
be  blamed  for  all  the  heavy  didactic  poetry  of  the  last 
century,  even  if  Ave  ascribe  many  faults  to  the  direct  imi- 
tation of  those  models.  We  have  already  seen  how^  urgent 
was  the  yearning  for  moral  teaching,  and  we  find  other 
poets  inspired  by  the  same  gloom.  Blair's  "  Grave  "  (pub- 
lished 1743,  Avritten  before  1731)  shows  by  its  title  Avhat 
were  the  chief  pleasures  to  be  got  from  the  poetical  litera- 
ture of  the  time.  While  the  very  subject  Avas  awe-inspir- 
ing, passages  like  the  following  are  doubtless  Avhat  per- 
haps as  much  as  any  rewarded  the  reader  : 

"  See  yonder  hallowed  fane  !  the  pious  work 
Of  names  once  famed,  now  dubious  or  forgot, 
And  buried  midst  the  wreck  of  things  which  were: 
Tliere  lie  interred  the  more  illustrious  dead. 
The  wind  is  up :  liark  !  how  it  howls  !  methinks 
Till  now  I  never  heard  a  sound  so  dreary  ! 
Doors  creak,  and  windows  clap,  and  night's  foul  bird, 
Roek'd  in  the  spire,  screams  loud :  the  gloomy  aisles. 
Black-plastered,  and  hung  round  with  shreds  of  'scutcheons, 
And  tattered  coats-of-arms,  send  back  the  sound, 


English  Literature.  379 

Laden  with  heavier  airs,  from  the  low  vaults, 

The  mansions  of  tlffe  dead.     Roused  from  their  slumbers, 

In  grim  array  the  grisly  spectres  rise, 

Grin  horrible,  and  obstinately  sullen, 

Pass,  and  repass,  hushed  as  the  foot  of  night. 

Again  the  screech-owl  shrieks — ungracious  sound  ! 

I'll  hear  no  more — it  makes  one's  blood  run  chill." 

We  perceive  that  both  Blair  and  Young  had  read  Shak- 
spere  and  Milton,  and  that  they  both  imitated  certain 
qualities  of  the  older  blank-verse.  They  turned  from  the 
couplet,  just  as  it  seemed  to  have  been  firmly  fixed,  and 
received  from  those  older  writers  the  torch  of  real — as 
distinguished  from  reasonable — poetry.  The  light  burned 
dim,  and,  as  we  have  seen,  blue  ;  the  main  use  of  the  new 
verse  was  the  promotion  of  orthodox  religious  views.  It 
was  the  dramatic — can  one  say  the  melodramatic  ? — view 
of  the  grave  as  an  inspirer  of  pleasing  gloom  that  was 
preparing  readers  for  the  romantic  outbreak.  At  this 
period,  the  properties  of  the  poet  were  but  few  :  the  tomb, 
an  occasional  raven  or  screech-owl,  and  the  pale  moon, 
with  skeletons  and  grinning  ghosts.  It  was  on  this  dark 
assemblage  of  horrors  that  he  depended  for  his  most 
thrilling  effects.  All  these  seemed  to  belong  to  the  teacher 
of  morality  ;  they  enforced  his  lessons  with  irrefutable  ar- 
guments. One  might  as  well  try  to  drive  away  a  ghost 
with  fire-arms  as  with  ill-timed  frivolity,  and  frivolity  was 
the  companion  of  this  morbid  gloom  ;  frivolity  and  coarse- 
ness, for  it  would  be  hard  to  find  a  time  in  modem  his- 
tory Avhen  there  was  less  appreciation  of  beauty  in  the 
world  than  then.  Even  the  poets  had  yet  to  learn  to  en- 
joy natural  scenery,  and  what  the  life  of  the  time  was  we 
may  see  in  Fielding's  and  Smollett's  novel,  and  in  the  grim 
horrors  of  Hogarth's  plates.  For  a  further  proof  of  the 
connection  between  the  fine  arts  and  the  life  of  the  time, 


380  English  Literature. 

consider  these  memorable  designs,  with  tlieir  moral  teach- 
ing. Hogarth  is  celebrated  as  the^great  E)tglish  artist ; 
his  unceasing  morality  and  realism  ax-e  what  give  him  that 
fame.  Every  one  who  writes  about  him  speaks  of  his 
useful  lessons  of  morality,  and  it  was  the  necessity  of 
teaching  morality  that  had  so  disastrous  an  effect  on  the 
poetry  of  the  last  century.  At  least,  this  was  part  of  the 
trouble,  and  a  great  part.  Even  now  writers  maintain 
that  the  poet's  first  duty  is  to  enforce  moral  lessons,  and 
any  one  who  questions  this  is  supposed  to  urge  teaching 
immorality.  There  is  still  a  certain  novelty  in  the  affirma- 
tion that  art  is  not  didactic,  although  for  nearly  a  hundred 
years  Goethe's  words  have  been  slowly  influencing  writers 
and  readers.  What  brought  him  to  it  was  the  inevitable 
reaction  from  the  exaggerated  preaching  of  the  last  cen- 
tury, when  imagination  was  dead  and  its  ghost  haunted 
the  churchyard.  Even  Gray's  "  Elegy "  has  its  scene 
there,  you  will  remember.  Even  Boyse,  the  dissolute  and 
shirtless  poet,  whom  I  have  mentioned  as  a  frivolous  per- 
son, Avrote  verses  that  would  have  done  credit  to  a  bishop. 
It  was  doubtless  Avith  a  keen  eye  on  his  market,  and  not 
from  an  overflowing  heart,  that  he  composed  his  long 
poem  on  Deity  : 

"  Hence  triumphs  truth  beyond  objection  clear 
(Let  unbelief  attend  and  slirink  with  fear !) 
That  what  for  ever  was — must  surely  be 
Beyond  commencement,  and  from  period  free,"  etc. 

A  paraphrase  of  the  third  chapter  of  Job,  and  a  few 
sets  of  verses  on  the  death  of  his  friends  and  relatives, 
are  among  the  further  contributions  of  this  wretched  rake 
to  the  literature  of  his  country.  The  influence  must  have 
been  strong  that  made  even  him  a  contributor  to  Dr. 
Watts's  "Horae  Lyricai."  We  have  seen  how  the  need 
of  decency  impressed  itself  on  the  public  after  the  ex- 


Engluh  Literature.  381 

cesses  of  the  writers  of  the  Restoration,  and  Dr.  Watts 
himself  is  another  witness  to  this  fact.  In  the  Preface 
to  his  poems,  written  in  1709,  he  says  :  "Thus  almost  in 
vain  have  the  throne  and  the  pulpit  cried  reformation  ; 
while  the  stage  and  licentious  poems  have  waged  open 
war  with  the  pious  design  of  Church  and  State  "  (An- 
derson's "  Poets,"  ix.  296)  ;  and  he  goes  on  to  show  the 
poetical  wealth  of  the  Old  Testament  in  order  to  disprove 
the  assumption  "  that  poetry  and  vice  are  naturally  akin." 
It  was  not  strange  that  this  opinion  was  held,  for,  he 
says,  "  many  of  the  writers  of  the  first  i-ank,  in  this  our 
age  of  national  Christians,  have,  to  their  eternal  shame, 
surpassed  the  vilest  of  the  Gentiles.  .  .  .  The  vices  have 
been  painted  like  so  many  goddesses,  the  charms  of  wit 
have  been  added  to  debauchery."  It  was  Dr.  Watts's 
aim  to  write  poetry  in  the  service  of  religion,  and  he  had 
many  rivals  and  aids.  Society  was  reacting  from  the  ex- 
cesses of  frivolous  writers. 

IV.  Closely  connected  with  these  moral  reformers  were 
the  didactic  poets.  We  need  not  linger  long  over  their 
well  -  meant  but  tedious  productions.  John  Phillips's 
"  Cyder,"  with  its  pseudo-Miltonic  versification,  seems  to 
have  been  the  favorite  model.  Take  Grainger's  "  Sugar- 
Cane,"  for  example  (1764),  iii.  455  : 

"  False  Gallia's  sons,  that  hoe  the  oceau-isles, 
Mis  with  their  sugar  loads  of  worthless  sand, 
Fraudful,  their  weight  of  sugar  to  increase. 
Far  be  such  guile  from  Britain's  honest  swains. 
Such  arts,  awhile,  the  unwary  may  surprise, 
And  benefit  the  impostor ;  but,  ere  long, 
The  skilful  buyer  will  the  fraud  detect, 
And,  with  abhorrence,  reprobate  the  name." 

Or  take  this  : 

"  Be  thrifty,  planter,  e'en  thy  skimmings  save: 
For,  planter,  know,  the  refuse  of  the  cane 


382  English  Literature. 

Serves  needful  purposes.     Are  barbecues 
The  cates  thou  lovest  ?     What  like  rich  skimmings  feed 
The  grunting,  bristly  kind  ?     Your  labouring  mules 
They  soon  invigorate,"  etc. 

Then   there   is   Dr.  Armstrong's    "Art   of   Preserving 
Health  "  (1744),  in  which  we  are  taught  to 

"  Fly,  if  you  can,  these  violent  extremes 
Of  air :  the  wholesome  is  nor  moist  nor  dry. 
But  as  the  power  of  choosing  is  deny'd 
To  half  mankind,  a  further  task  ensues ; 
How  best  to  mitigate  these  fell  extremes. 
How  breathe,  unhurt,  the  withering  clement, 
Or  hazy  atmosphere.  .  .  . 

***** 
If  the  raw  and  oozy  heaven  offend. 
Correct  the  soil,  and  dry  the  sources  up 
Of  watery  exhalation :  wide  and  deep 
Conduct  your  trenches  thro'  the  quaking  bog. 

.  .  .  and  let  your  table  smoke 
With  solid  roast  or  baked ;  or  what  the  herds 
Of  tamer  beasts  supply,"  etc. 

I  add  an  extract  from  Dyer's  "  Fleece"  (1757)  : 

"  See  the  bold  emigrants  of  Accadie, 
And  Massachusett,  happy  in  those  arts 
That  join  the  politics  of  trade  and  war. 
Bearing  the  palm  in  either :  they  appear 
Better  exemplars;  and  that  hardy  crew. 
Who,  on  the  frozen  beach  of  Newfoundland, 
Hang  their  white  fish  amid  the  parching  winds : 
The  kindly  fleece,  in  webs  of  Duffield  woof, 
Their  limbs,  benumb'd,  enfolds  with  cheerly  warmth, 
And  frieze  of  Cambria,  worn  by  those  who  seek 
Thro'  gulfs  and  dales  of  Hudson's  winding  bay, 
The  beaver's  fur,  tho'  oft  they  seek  in  vain, 
While  winter's  frosty  rigor  checks  approach, 
E'en  in  the  fiftieth  latitude." 

Must  it  not  have  seemed  as  if  Pesfasus  would  never 


English  Literature.  383 

clap  his  wings  again,  when  he  had  been  thus  harnessed 
in  domestic  service  and  had  to  bear  such  heavy  burdens  ? 
Yet  the  poets  followed  the  instincts  of  their  time  in  de- 
voting themselves  to  the  celebration  of  the  duties  and 
charms  of  civilization.  May  it  not  be  that  their  work  is 
not  wholly  lost,  and  that  they  may  yet  deserve  our  grati- 
tude by  serving  as  a  warning  for  those  who  would  follow 
the  advice  of  outsiders  and  make  poetry  an  advertisement 
of  science  ?  The  arguments  that  are  brought  up  now  to 
urge  poets  to  celebrate  scientific  discoveries  were  used  in 
the  last  century  in  behalf  of  the  glories  of  civilization  and 
the  laws  of  morality.  What  the  result  was,  I  have  tried 
to  show  ;  it  is  certainly  of  a  kind  to  discourage  writing 
to  order.  Yet  evidently  this  way  of  writing  came  as  a 
natural  result  of  what  had  gone  before,  the  especial  form 
it  took  being  based  on  the  didactic  poetry  of  Greece  and 
Rome,  with,  probably,  blank-verse  to  serve  as  a  concession 
to  those  w^lio  demanded  something  congenial.  The  same 
j^henomenon,  mutatis  mutandis,  had  taken  place  in  Italy. 
Hesiod's  "  Works  and  Days  "  and  Vergil's  "  Georgics  " 
found  modeni  followers — the  Vergil  especially — as  a  mat- 
ter of  course.  Indeed,  the  first  Italian  imitation  was  by 
Rucellai,  the  author  of  the  "  Rosmunda,"  who  was  most 
eager  in  copying  Roman  literature.*  His  "  Api  "  (pub- 
lished 1539)  was  almost  a  continuation  of  the  fourth 
"  Georgic."  Then  there  was  Alamanni's  "  Coltivazione," 
a  few  years  later.  These  were  imitated  by  French  writers 
{vide  Ginguene's  "  Hist.  Litt.  de  ITtalie,"  vol.  ix.  chap,  i.), 
and  it  was  under  similar  inspiration  that  the  English 
didactic  poets  wrote.  The  peculiar  religious  tone,  and 
the  fimereal  flavor,  are  peculiarly  English,  and  it  is  to 


*  We  should  always  bear  in  mind  the  enormous  weight  of  the  prece- 
dent of  Roman  imitation  of  Greek  literature. 


384  English  Literature. 

them,  doubtless,  that  their  reputation  for  the  spleen,  etc., 
is  mainly  due.  Young's  "  Night  Thoughts,"  for  instance, 
was  put  into  French  and  Italian  ;  Phillips's  "  Cyder,"  as 
we  saw,  into  Italian,  etc.*  Yet  some  of  the  men  who 
wrote  the  dreariest  of  these  poems  at  times  gave  proof  of 
a  finer  poetical  sense.  There  is  much  truth  in  at  least  the 
first  part  of  what  Dr.  Johnson  said  of  Dyer,  that  although 
he,  "  whose  mind  was  not  unpoetical,  has  done  his  utmost, 
by  interesting  his  reader  in  our  native  commodity,  by  in- 
terspersing rural  imagery  and  incidental  digressions,  by 
clothing  small  images  in  great  words,  and  by  all  the 
writer's  arts  of  delusion,  the  meanness  naturally  adhering, 
and  the  irreverence  habitually  annexed  to  trade  and  manu- 
facture, sink  him  under  insuperable  oppression  ;  and  the 
disgust  which  blank-verse,  encumbering  and  encumbered, 
superadds  to  an  unpleasing  subject,  soon  repels  the  reader, 
however  willing  to  be  pleased."  We  see  here  Dr.  John- 
son's detestation  of  blank-verse  ;  and  the  question  of  the 
relative  excellence  of  that  and  of  the  couplet  was  a  burn- 
ing one  in  the  last  century.  Doubtless  blank-verse  was  a 
reaction  against  the  couplet.  It  was  the  first  sign  of  a 
protest  against  that  rigid  form,  just  as  in  Milton's  hands 
it  was  the  last  measure  in  which  a  poet  of  heroic  propor- 
tions spoke  to  the  world.  Yet  the  instrument  he  com- 
manded the  puny  bardlings  of  the  last  century  could  not 
handle  ;  his  dignity  was  mimicked  by  a  feeble  rumble,  as 
if  the  secret  of  his  art  consisted  in  placing  adjectives  as 
far  from  their  nouns  as  possible,  and  in  transposing  the 
intervening  words.  Yet  they  felt  the  charm  of  his  verse  ; 
that  was  something,  and  they  maintained  their  side  with 

*  Vide  Symonds,  "  Renaissance  in  Italy,"  v.  236-7. 

In  France,  among  other  didactic  poems,  L.  Racine's  "  La  Religion,  La 
Grace ;"  Lemierrc's  "  La  Peiuture  ;"  Boucher's  "  Le  Mois ;"  and  the  writings 
of  Delille  and  St.  Lambert. 


English  Literature.  385 

obstinacy  in  the  face  of  violent  opposition.  The  main  ob- 
jection to  them  is  as  well  stated  in  these  lines  by  Robert 
Lloyd,  as  by  any  one  : 

"  Some  Milton-mad  (an  affectation 
Gleau'd  up  from  college-education*) 
Approve  no  verse,  but  that  which  flows 
In  epithetic  measur'd  prose, 
With  trim  expressions  daily  drest, 
Stol'n,  misapplied,  and  not  confest, 
And  call  it  writing  in  the  style 
Of  that  great  Homeu  of  our  isle. 
Wlulom^  what  time,  eftsoons  and  erst, 
(So  prose  is  oftentimes  beverst) 
Sprinkled  with  quaint,  fantastic  phrase, 
Uncouth  to  ears  of  modern  days, 
Make  up  the  metre  which  they  call, 
Blank,  classic  blank,  their  all  in  all." 

Yet  Lloyd  had  imitated  Spenser,  in  a  poem  called  "  The 
Progress  of  Envy  "  (iVol),  in  which  he  had  defended  both 
Spenser  and  Milton.  Evidently  the  current  was  running 
with  some  force  by  the  middle  of  the  century.  Dr.  John- 
son evidently  thought  so  {vide  Rambler,  No.  121).  "  There 
are,  I  think,  two  schemes  of  writing,  on  which  the  labori- 
ous wits  of  the  present  time  employ  their  faculties.  .  .  . 
The  other  is  the  imitation  of  Spenser,  which,  by  the  influ- 
ence of  some  men  of  learning  and  genius,  seems  likely  to 
gain  upon  the  age,  and  therefore  deserves  to  be  more  at- 
tentively considered.  .  .  .  To  imitate  the  fictions  and  senti- 
ments of  Spenser  can  incur  no  reproach,"  but  not  so  with 
his  diction  and  stanza.  The  imitations  are  carelessly  done. 
"  Perhaps,  however,  the  style  of  Spenser  might  by  long 
labour  be  justly  copied;  but  life  is  surely  given  us  for, 

*  Many  of  the  university  men  were  leaders  in  this  movement ;  notably 
the  Wartons. 

17 


386  English  Literature. 

higher  purposes  than  to  gather  what  our  ancestors  have 
wisely  thrown  away,  and  to  learn  what  is  of  no  value,  but 
because  it  has  been  forgotten."* 

V.  Yet  the  only  man  whose  blank-verse  is,  even  in  pas- 
sages, impressive  is  James  Thomson,  whose  "  Seasons"  is 
still  a  classic.  Even  Johnson  acknowledged  this,  for  he 
says,  "  His  is  one  of  the  works  in  which  blank- verse  seems 
properly  used.  Thomson's  wide  expansion  of  general 
views,  and  his  enumeration  of  circumstantial  varieties, 
would  have  been  obstructed  and  embarrassed  by  the  fre- 
quent intersection  of  the  sense,  which  are  the  necessary 
effects  of  rhyme."  Curiously  enough.  Pope  helped  Thom- 
son with  suggestions,  and,  more  than  that,  with  lines  from 
his  own  pen.  Here  is  an  instance  ("  Chambers's  Cyclo- 
paedia of  Eng.  Lit."  ii.  13).     Thomson  had  written  : 

"  Thoughtless  of  beauty,  she  was  beauty's  self, 
Recluse  among  the  woods ;  if  city  dames 
Will  deign  their  faith  :  and  thus  she  went,  compelled 
By  strong  necessity,  with  as  serene 
And  pleased  a  look  as  Patience  e'er  put  on, 
To  glean  Palemon's  fields." 


*  Cumberland,  in  his  "  Memoirs,"  throws  ranch  light  on  the  taste  of 
his  time.  Thus  [Am.  ed.],  p.  64 :  "I  well  remembei',  when  I  was  newly 
come  to  college,  with  what  avidity  I  read  the  Greek  tragedians,  and  with 
what  reverence  I  swallowed  the  absurdities  of  their  chorus,  and  was 
bigoted  to  their  cold  characters  and  frigid  unities ;"  p.  66 :  "I  had  no 
books  of  my  own,  and  unfortunately  got  engaged  with  Spenser's  '  Faery 
Queen ;'  in  imitation  of  which  I  began  to  string  nonsensical  stanzas  to  the 
same  rhyming  kind  of  measure.  Though  I  trust  I  should  not  have  sur- 
rendered myself  for  any  length  of  time  to  the  jingling  strain  of  obsolete 
versification,  yet  I  am  indebted  to  my  mother  for  the  seasonable  contempt 
she  threw  upon  my  imitations.  I  felt  the  force  of  her  reproof  and  laid 
the  'Faery  Queen'  upon  the  shelf."  This  was  when  he  was  a  student  at 
Trinity  College,  Cambridge.  His  mother  had  read  Shakspere  witli  him  in 
liis  boyhood. 


English  Literature.  387 

For  those  lines  Pope  substituted  these  : 

"  Thoughtless  of  beauty,  she  was  beauty's  self, 
Recluse  among  the  close-embowering  woods, 
As  in  the  hollow  breast  of  Apennine, 
Beneath  the  shelter  of  encircling  hills 
A  myrtle  rises,  far  from  human  eyes, 
And  breathes  its  balmy  fragrance  o'er  the  wild ; 
So  flourished  blooming,  and  unseen  by  all, 
The  sweet  Lavinia  ;  till  at  length  compelled 
By  strong  necessity's  supreme  command, 
With  smiling  patience  in  her  looks,  she  went 
To  glean  Palemon's  fields." 

Probably  few  on  reading  these  lines  would  ever  guess 
that  Pope  wrote  them,  so  relentlessly  was  he  borne  away 
by  the  greater  forces  that  carry  us  all  on.  When  a  regi- 
ment of  soldiers  is  passing  by,  with  a  band  of  music  at  its 
head,  all  marching  with  one  uniform  swing,  peaceful  citi- 
zens straighten  their  backs  and  find  themselves  instinc- 
tively keeping  step  with  the  moving  mass  ;  in  the  same 
way  are  poets  inspired  by  the  influences  around  them. 
We  have  seen  how  Addison,  who  was  distinctively  a  man 
of  this  age,  misplaced  in  the  beginning  of  the  last  cen- 
tury, occasionally  fell  from  the  ranks  and  lost  step  as  he 
praised  ballads  ;  but  he  was  promptly  hustled  back  into 
line  by  his  pompous  contemporaries.  So  here  we  have 
Pope  as  he  might  have  been  in  more  truly  poetical  times. 
When  he  was  making  up  his  mind  what  path  to  follow, 
his  guides — and  with  great  intelligence — told  him  that 
correctness  was  lacking  in  English  poetry,  and  lie  became 
a  correct  writer.  Thomson  wearied  of  the  correctness, 
and,  for  another  thing,  he  inherited  with  his  Scotch  blood 
a  love  of  nature  which  we  find  in  almost  all  the  poets  of 
that  country,, even  in  the  most  artificial  times.  In  the 
present  day,  patriotic  Scotchmen  take  a  great  deal  of 
credit  to  themselves  for  this  immunity  which  some  of 


388  English  Literature. 

their  ancestors  enjoyed  from  the  epidemic  artificial  opin- 
ions. Yet  may  not  we  who  are  not  Scotchmen  be  bold 
enough  to  say  this  exemption  is  due  to  some  extent  to 
their  geographical  position,  and  jiot  wholly  to  their  lofti- 
er natures,  and  that  they  bought  it  at  the  cost  of  much 
savageness?  It  was  doubtless  well  worth  the  purchase- 
money.  Not  only  did  the  peasants  keep  alive  the  gift 
of  song,  but  many  of  the  educated  people  continued  to 
admire  and  to  imitate  the  older  writers.  Collections  of 
Scotch  songs  and  ballads  were  published  very  early  in 
the  last  century,*   and,  more  than  this,  even  those  who 


*  Watson's  "  Choice  Collection  of  Comic  and  Serious  Scots  Poems  " 
(3  vols.,  1706-9-11)  was  the  first.  Thus,  "  The  Publisher  to  the  Reader  " 
says :  "  As  the  frequency  of  Publishing  Collections  of  Miscellaneous  Poems 
in  our  Neighbouring  Kingdoms  and  States,  may,  in  a  great  measure,  Justify 
an  Undertaking  of  this  kind  with  us ;  so  'tis  hoped,  that  this  being  the 
first  of  its  Nature  which  has  been  published  in  our  own  Native  Scots  Dia- 
lect, the  Candid  Reader  may  be  the  more  easily  induced,  through  the  Con- 
sideration thereof,  to  give  some  Charitable  Grains  of  Allowance,  if  the 
Performance  come  not  up  to  such  a  Point  of  Exactness  as  may  please  an 
over  nice  Palate." 

In  England  there  had  appeared  Dryden's  "Miscellany  Poems"  (1G84- 
1708).  "A  Collection  of  Old  Ballads"  appeared  in  1723,  and  in  1726  and 
1738.  Watson's  Collection  inspired  Allan  Ramsay  to  compile  his  "Ever- 
green, Scots  Poems  wrote  by  the  Ingenious  before  1600"  (1724),  and  his 
"  Tea  Table  Miscellany  "  the  same  year,  which  speedily  ran  througii  twelve 
editions.  The  "Tea  Table  Miscellany"  contained  "All  in  the  Downs  the 
Fleet  was  moored,"  "  If  she  be  not  fair  for  me,"  Mallet's  "  William  and 
Margaret,"  etc.  In  short,  it  is  very  much  such  a  collection  as  would  be 
made  now.  It  was  followed  by  "  A  New  Miscellany  of  Scots  Songs " 
(1727),  and,  in  1769,  Herd's  "Ancient  and  Modern  Scottish  Songs,  Heroic 
Ballads,"  etc.  This  was  four  years  after  the  publication  of  Percy's  "  Re- 
liques." 

It  scarcely  need  be  said  that  collections  of  admired  poems  were  not  new. 
They  were  familiar  in  England  and  France  ;  these  volumes  are  important  as 
showing  the  new  direction  in  which  modern  taste  was  turning,  towards  the 


English  Literature.  389 

bowed  before  the  fashionable  idols  at  other  times  fol- 
lowed their  own  bent  in  writing  in  simpler  forms.  Thus, 
Allan  Ramsay,  who  wrote  a  few  now  forgotten  poems 
of  the  usual  kind,  stepped  into  fame  with  his  "  Gentle 
Shepherd"  (1725),  which,  though  it  now  reads  like  a 
conventional  drama,  seemed  like  a  breath  of  fresh  air 
to  those  who  first  read  it.  All  the  wits  of  the  time 
admired  it,  and  justly.  "VVe  have  seen  that  the  pastoral 
poetry  of  the  time  was  perhaps  the  most  artificial  of  all 
the  kinds  of  poetical  composition  then  practised.  The 
satirical  poems  were  natural ;  Pope's,  at  least,  are  the  talk 
of  a  witty  man,  and  hence  essentially  as  genuine  as  the 
talk  of  peasants.  The  pastorals,  however,  were  as  artificial 
as  paper  flowers,  and  these  threefold  dilutions  of  classicism 
Avere  thrown  into  the  shade  by  this  play,  which  contains 
many  true  touches,  and  some  pretty  passages,  although 
the  device  by  which  the  hero  and  heroine  are  found  not 
to  be  peasants  at  all,  but  very  much  finer  people,  shows  us 
how  even  writers  who  desire  to  begin  a  reform  have,  like 
every  one  else,  to  climb  up-hill  a  step  at  a  time.  In  Gom- 
bault's  "  Endymion  "  the  poor  shepherd  is  found  to  be  of 
very  noble  family,  and  is  hence  able  to  marry  the  rich 
shepherdess.  In  Vauquelin  de  la  Fresnaie's  "  Idillie," 
No.  48,  the  rustic  Sylvin  learns  that  he  is  some  one  else, 
with  the  same  result.     Even  now  novel  -  writers  are  not 

past.  Simultaneously  in  France,  it  is  curious  to  notice,  there  appeared  the 
first  signs  of  interest  in  the  earlier  writers.  In  1*723  came  out  Coustelier's 
collection  containing  the  works  of  poets  before  Marot,  and  in  1731  Lenglet- 
Dufresnoy's  edition  of  Marot,  while  what  Sainte-Beuve  calls  the  reaction 
chevaleresque  dates  from  the  reprinting  of  the  "  Petit  Jehan  de  Saintre  " 
(1*724),  and  of  "Gerard  de  Nevers"  (1725).  Tressan's  adaptations  of  the 
old  romances  furthered  the  same  taste.  In  1742  appeared  an  edition  of  the 
poems  of  Thibaut  de  Champagne,  etc.  For  a  fuller  list,  see  Sainte-Beuve'a 
"  Tableau  de  la  Poesie  Franc^aise  au  XVP  Siecle,"  p.  482  et  seq. 


,00  English  Literature. 

tired  of  this  very  old  device.  Ramsay  was  quite  capable 
of  repeating  the  sounds  he  heard  about  him.     Thus  : 

"  Ye  shepherds  and  nymphs  that  adorn  the  gay  plain, 
Approach  from  your  sports,  and  attend  to  my  strain ; 
Amongst  all  your  number  a  lover  so  true, 
Was  ne'er  so  undone,  with  such  bliss  in  his  view. 
Was  ever  a  nymph  so  hard-hearted  as  mine  ? 
She  knows  me  sincere,  and  she  sees  how  I  pine,"  etc. 

This,  of  course,  is  but  trifling— the  small-talk  of  poetry 

which  is  never  of  the  nature  of  an  affidavit.    He  wrote 

odes,  and  various  versions  and  translations,  but  all  that 
lives  are  his  "  Gentle  Shepherd,"  and  a  few  songs  written 
in  imitation  of  the  ancient  Scottish  manner— e.  g.,  "  The 
Braes  of  Yarrow  " — 

"  Busk  ye,  busk  ye,  my  bonny,  bonny  bride, 
Busk  ye,  busk  ye,  my  winsome  marrow  !" 

In  England  the  poets  could  not  so  readily  turn  to  still 
living  popular  treasures  of  poetry.  The  change  had  to  be 
made  by  choosing  other  models  to  copy.  It  was  a  literary 
change — that  is  to  say,  writers  made  themselves  over  with 
an  eye  to  imitating  other  poets,  rather  than  with  the  sim- 
ple desire  of  painting  nature.  And,  as  I  have  so  often 
said,  it  was  Milton  and  Spenser  who  were  admired  and 
copied.*  Thomson  wrote  his  "  Castle  of  Indolence  "  in 
the  Spenserian  stanza,  and  this  novelty  was  followed  by 
many  now  forgotten  bards. 

One  of  the  greatest  poems  of  the  last  century  was 
Gray's  "  Elegy  in  a  Country  Churchyard  "  (1 749) .  Man's 
mortality,  as  we  have  seen,  was  a  favorite  subject  of 
his  contemporaries  and  predecessors  ;  but  Gray  does  not 
try  to  show  the  horror  of  the  generally  recognized  fact. 
He  rather  sets  before  us  the  pathos  of  an  obscure  life  and 

*  Vide  L.  Stephen's  "  History  of  English  Thought,"  ii.  359. 


English  Literature.  391 

untimely  death  ;  and  life  is,  one  may  say,  a  poet's  first 
Subject.  Often,  too,  it  is  more  profoundly  pathetic  than 
any  death.  Young's  prolonged  declamation  about  the 
tomb  makes  us  sad,  to  be  sure,  but  only  by  its  unrelenting 
persistence,  while  Gray's  irnmortal  elegy  is  full  of  real 
melancholy,  which  is  not  despair,  but  thoughtfulness.  It 
may  be  doubted  whether  any  other  poem  in  the  English 
language  has  been  so  frequently  imitated.*  No  one  of 
the  copies,  however,  comes  anywhere  near  the  original. 
Gray  has  other  claims  upon  our  admiration,  for  he  was 
one  of  the  first  of  writers  to  treat  a  mountain  with 
proper  respect.  It  will  be  remembered  that  earlier  in 
the  century  mountains  were  the  scorn  of  mankind.  Gray 
was  almost  the  first  to  mention  their  grandeur.  Thus, 
writing  to  his  mother  from  Lyons,  Oct.  13,  1739,  he 
says  :  "It  is  a  fortnight  since  we  set  out  hence  upon  a  lit- 
tle excursion  to  Geneva.  We  took  the  longest  road,  which 
lies  through  Savoy,  on  purpose  to  see  a  famous  monastery, 
called  the  Grande  Chartreuse,  and  had  no  reason  to  think 
our  time  lost.  .  .  .  From  thence  (Eehelles)  we  proceeded  on 

*  Falconer,  Thomas  Warton,  James  Graeme,  William  Whitehead,  John 
Scott,  Henry  Headley,  Sir  John  Henry  Moore,  Robert  Lovell,  are  but  a  few 
of  the  numberless  poets  who  imitated  it.  "It  spread,"  Mr.  Mason  says, 
"  at  first  on  account  of  the  affecting  and  pensive  cast  of  the  subject,  just 
like  Hervey's  '  Meditations  on  the  Tombs.'  Soon  after  its  publication  I 
remember  sitting  with  Mr.  Gray  in  his  college  apartment.  He  expressed 
to  me  his  surprise  at  the  I'apidity  of  its  sale.     I  replied  : 

'  Sunt  lacryma?  rerum,  et  mentem  mortalia  tangunt.' 
He  paused  awhile,  and,  taking  his  pen,  wrote  the  line  on  a  printed  copy 
of  it  lying  on  his  table.  '  This,'  said  he, '  shall  be  its  future  motto.'  '  Pity,' 
said  I,  '  that  Dr.  Young's  "  Night  Thoughts  "  have  preoccupied  it.'  '  So,' 
replied  he, '  indeed  it  is.' "  The  resemblance  between  the  two  men  was 
not  confined  to  their  admiration  for  that  one  line.  Yet  the  difference  be- 
tween them  was  greater :  one  was  a  rhetorician,  the  other  a  poet.  Each 
delivered  the  depressing  message  of  the  age  in  his  own  way. 


392  EnglUh  Literature. 

horses  who  are  used  to  the  way,  to  the  mountain  of  the 
Chartreuse.  It  is  six  miles  to  the  top  ;  the  road  runs 
winding  up  it,  commonly  not  six  feet  broad  ;  on  one  hand 
is  the  rock,  with  woods  of  pine  trees  hanging  overhead  ; 
on  the  other  a  monstrous  precipice,  almost  perpendicu- 
lar, at  the  bottom  of  which  rolls  a  torrent,  that,  some- 
times tumbling  among  the  fragments  of  stone  that  have 
fallen  from  on  high,  and  sometimes  precipitating  itself 
down  vast  descents  with  a  noise  like  thunder,  which  is 
still  made  greater  from  the  echo  of  the  moimtains  on  each 
side,  concurs  to  form  one  of  the  most  solemn,  the  most  ro- 
mantic, and  the  most  astonishing  scenes  I  ever  beheld. 
Add  to  this  the  strange  views  made  by  the  crags  and 
cliffs  on  the  other  hand,  the  cascades  that  in  many  places 
throw  themselves  from  the  very  summit  down  into  the 
vale  and  river  below,  and  many  other  particulars  impossi- 
ble to  describe,  you  will  conclude  we  had  no  occasion  to 
repent  our  pains." 

Even  then  Gray  at  times  used  the  language  of  his  day. 
Thus,  Nov.  V,  1739  :  "The  winter  was  so  far  advanced  as 
in  great  measure  to  spoil  the  beauty  of  the  prospect ;  how- 
ever, there  was  still  somewhat  fine  remaining  amidst  the 
savageness  and  horror  of  the  place." 

And  Dec.  19  of  the  same  year,  he  speaks  of  the  Apen- 
nines as  "  not  so  horrid  as  the  Alps,  though  pretty  near  as 
high."  Horrid,  of  course,  as  with  Addison  and  others, 
had  not  its  present  common  meaning  of  odious,  but  rather 
that  of  auifid. 

His  warmest  utterance  is  this,  Nov.  16, 1739  :  "I  own  I 
have  not  as  yet  met  anywhere  those  grand  and  simple 
works  of  art  that  are  to  amaze  one,  and  whose  sight  one 
is  to  be  better  for  ;  but  those  of  nature  have  astonished 
me  beyond  expression.  In  our  little  journey  up  to  the 
Grande  Chartreuse,  I  do  not  remember  to  have  gone  ten 


EnglliiJi  Literature.  393 

paces  without  an  exclamation  that  there  was  no  restrain- 
ing :  not  a  precipice,  not  a  torrent,  not  a  cliff,  but  is  preg- 
nant with  religion  and  poetry." 

Gray  here  tasted  emotions  which  were  scarcely  to  be 
shared  with  any  one  for  many  years.  He  was,  in  this  re- 
spect, nearly  half  a  century  in  advance  of  most  of  his 
contemporaries.  * 

*  See  Gray's  correspondence  witli  Rev.  Xorton  Nicholls  and  Dr.  Whar- 
ton, in  1769,  concerning  the  Enghsli  lalces,  which  he  was  among  the  first 
to  visit,  and  his  "Tour  in  the  Lakes."  There  was  by  this  time  general  in- 
terest in  the  beauties  of  the  landscapes.  William  Gilpin's  "Observations 
and  Artistical  Remarks  on  the  Picturesque  Beauty  of  Various  Parts  of 
England,  Wales,  and  Scotland,"  began  to  appear;  the  remarks  on  the  Lake 
country  in  1789,  though  "  written  about  fifteen  years  before  they  were  pub- 
lished. They  were  at  first  thrown  together,  warm  from  the  subject,  each 
evening,  after  the  scene  of  the  day  had  been  presented  "  {inde  preface).  It 
was  the  MS.  of  Gilpin's  "  Tour  down  the  Wye "  which  Gray  annotated 
shortly  before  his  death. 

We  have  seen  that  Defoe's  "  Tour  through  Britain  "  showed  the  writer's 
fondness  for  Gothic  architecture.  Mountains  he  enjoyed  less.  Thus,  iii. 
258  (4th  ed.  1748) :  "  I  now  entered  Westmoreland^  a  county  eminent  only 
for  being  the  wildest,  most  barren,  and  frightful  of  any  that  I  have  passed 
over  in  England  or  in  Wales.  ...  It  must  be  owned,  however,  that  here 
are  some  very  pleasant  manufacturing  Towns,  and  consequently  pop- 
ulous ;"  yet  from  Lonsdale  "  we  have  a  very  fine  Prospect  of  the  Moun- 
tains at  a  vast  Distance  and  of  the  beautiful  Course  of  the  River  Lone,  in 
a  Valley  far  beneath  us."  Earlier,  however,  "As  these  hills  were  lofty, 
so  they  had  an  aspect  of  Terror.  Here  were  no  rich  pleasant  valleys 
between  thein,  as  among  the  Alps ;  no  Lead  Mines  and  Veins  of  rich 
Ore,  as  in  the  Peak ;  no  Coal-pits,  as  in  the  Hills  about  Halifax,  but  all 
barren  and  wild,  and  of  no  Use  either  to  Man  or  Beast."  Of  the  "  Winan- 
der  Mere"  he  says,  merely,  it  "is  famous  for  producing  the  char-fish.  .  .  . 
It  is  a  curious  Fish,  and,  as  a  Dainty,  is  polled  and  sent  far  and  near  by 
way  of  Present." 

In  the  "  Beauties  of  England  and  Wales,"  xv.  pt.  2,  p.  26,  under  West- 
moreland, "We  find,  indeed,  a  writer  of  considerable  taste  describing  his 
visit  to  Winandermere,  in  1748,  with  that  glow  of  language  which  such 
scenes  are  calculated  to  suggest  to  persons  living  in  cities  or  campaign 

17* 


394  English  Literature. 

As  Mr,  Arnold  has  shown,  Gray  was  a  victim  to  the  age 
in  which  he  lived.  We  every  day  see  men  ruinedTy  some 
fatal  defect  of  character,  by  some  overmastering  vice,  but 

countries.  '  We  came,'  says  he, '  upon  a  high  promontory,  that  gave  us  a 
full  view  of  the  bright  lake,  which,  spreading  itself  under  us,  in  the  midst 
of  the  mountains,  presented  one  of  the  most  glorious  appearances  that 
ever  struck  the  eye  of  the  traveller  with  transport." 

Vidf.^  also.  Dr.  Dalton's  "  Descriptive  Poem  :  Addressed  to  Two  Ladies 
on  their  Return  from  Viewing  the  Mines  near  Whitehaven,"  in  Pearch's 
"  Collection "  (succeeding  Dodsley's),  vol.  i.     This  poem  was  written  in 
1755.     After  praising  the  beauty  of  the  lake,  the  author  says  : 
"  Supreme  of  mountains,  Skiddaw,  hail ! 
To  whom  all  Britain  sinks  a  vale ! 
Lo,  his  imperial  brow  I  see 
From  foul  usurping  vapours  free ! 
'Twere  glorious  now  his  side  to  climb, 
Boldly  to  scale  his  top  sublime,"  etc. 
Page  52,  in  the  notes,  see  the  enthusiasm  of  "  the  late  ingenious  Dr. 
Brown,"  in  a  letter  to  a  friend.     "  On  the  opposite  shore,  you  will  find 
rocks  and  cliffs  of  stupendous  height  hanging  broken  over  the  lake  in 
horrible  grandeur."    The  "  Description  of  the  Neighbourhood  of  Keswick  " 
■was  published  in  1'76'7;  Hutchinson's  "E.xcursion  to  the  Lakes,"  in  1774; 
West's  Guide,  in  1778. 

Cumberland,  in  his  "  Memoirs  "  (Am.  ed.),  p.  195,  speaking  of  a  journey 
to  the  lakes  of  Cumberland  with  the  Earl  of  Warwick,  says,  *'  He  took 
■with  him  Mr.  Smith,  well  known  to  the  public  for  his  elegant  designs  after 
nature  in  Switzerland,  Italy,  and  elsewhere." 

A  few  German  writers  mention  Haller's  poem,  "  die  Alpen,"  as  a  turning- 
point  in  the  popular  taste  for  mountains,  but  this  is  exaggeration  (vide 
Adolf  Prey's  "  Alb.  von  Haller,"  p.  174).  Haller  held  the  utilitarian  ideas 
of  his  day  and  generation  about  mountains — thus : 

"  Wo  nichts,  was  notliig,  fehlt,  und  nur  was  nutzet,  bliiht. 
Der  Berge  wachsend  Eis,  der  Felsen  steiler  Wand 
Sind  sclbst  zum  niitzen  da,  und  triinken  das  Geland." 

— "  Poems,"  p.  44. 

This  note  has  already  swollen  beyond  all  measure,  or  it  would  be  well  to 
quote  passages  from  Rousseau's  "  Nouvelle  Helo'ise,"  which  fairly  threw 
the  mountains  open  to  the  world.      Vide,  also,  Petrarch's  account  of  his 


English  Literature.  395 

we  are  loss  disposed  to  acknowledge  the.JiTeskjtijjle  in- 
fluence of  an  uncongenjal  time.  Every  age  appears  with 
a  certain  set  of  moulds  into  which  it  is  necessary  that 
thosesKould  fit  who  are  to  attain  success,  and  those  who 
fail  to  accommodate  themselves  to  these  conditions  are 
thrown  out.  They  may  perform  some  work  which  their 
contemporaries  will  spurn,  but  which  another  generation 
may  admire  ;  yet  we  shall  always  haye_  to  regret  their  in- 
completeness, their  tragic  loneliness.  —....-,-..- 

If  all  the  world  is  a  stage,  a  good  many  people  are  cast 
into  the  wrong  parts,  and  Gray  was  a  melancholy  example 
of  this  uncongeniality.  He  was  continually  groping  for  a 
subject;  and  the  whole  endeavor  of  his  life  was  to  find 
something  more  truly  poetical  than  the  display  of  wit  and 
reason.  Goldsmith's  remarks,  already  quoted,  show  this, 
and  you  will  notice  the  dexterity  with  which  he  taunts 
those  who  take  "  pains  to  involve  [the  language]  into 
pristine  barbarity."  The  remote  past  was  tabooed,  and 
the  obvious  horrors  of  the  tomb  were  chanted  with  cloy- 
ing monotony,  while  the  elegiac  beauty  of  Gray's  short 
poem  was  almost  the  single  valuable  contribution  to  poe- 
try for  many  years.*  The  only  other  prominent  example 
was  Collins's  beautiful  odes  (1746),  which  have  that  rare 
touch  of  classic  beauty  which  is  precision  without  jDed- 
antry,  beauty  without  exaggeration,  simplicity  without 
commonness.  They  had  no  following,  however,  in  their 
own  time. 

ascent  of   Mt.  Ventoux,  "De  Rebus   Familiaribus,"  lib.  iv.  ep.  1.     See 
Quarterly  Revimv,  July,  1882. 

*  Gray  is  often  mentioned  as  the  first  of  English  poets  to  return  to 
old  Norse  themes  (thus  Gosse,  "  Gray,"  English  Men  of  Letters  Series, 
p.  163).  But  see  Dryden's  "Miscellany  Poems,"  vi.  387  (ed.  1716),  for  a 
translation  from  the  Hervarer  Saga.  This  collection  contains  numerous 
old  songs  and  ballads,  and  selections  from  Ben  Jonson  and  Donne 


39^  J^'nglisli  Literature. 


CHAPTER  IX. 

I.  I  HAVE  already  spoken  of  Goldsmith's  taunts  about 
those  who  formed  the  new  school,  and  he  frequently  ex- 
pressed very  genuine  impatience  with  his  contemporaries. 
Sometimes  he  seems  to  have  written  as  if  Dr.  Johnson  were 
looking  over  his  shoulder,  and  there  is  an  air  of  solemnity 
and  authority  about  him  which  can  scarcely  have  been 
natural.  Yet  his  position  on  the  conservative  side  in  the 
literary  controversies  made  him  assume  the  tone  of  a  teach- 
er, and  his  own  work  is  full  of  the  influences  of  his  time. 
It  is  not  surprising  that  he  was  vexed  with  the  somewhat 
formless  utterances  of  his  felloM^-bards,  for  in  his  hands 
the  measure  which  had  already  been  employed  by  so 
many  poets  acquired  new  grace.  The  "  Traveller  "  (1765) 
leaves  us  cold,  although  there  are  good  lines  here  and 
there— for  we  no  longer  seek  "  to  find  that  happiest  spot 
below,"  nor  could  we  rest  satisfied  Avith  the  linirerincr 
optimism  which  persuaded  Goldsmith  that, 

"  perhaps,  if  countries  we  compare, 
And  estimate  the  blessings  wiiicli  tliey  share, 
Though  patriots  flatter,  still  shall  wisdom  find 
An  equal  portion  dealt  to  all  mankind  ; 
As  different  good,  by  art  or  nature  given, 
To  different  nations  make  their  blessings  even." 
And  that, 

"every  state  to  one  lov'd  blessing  prone. 
Conforms  and  models  life  to  that  alone. 
Each  to  the  favorite  happiness  attends. 
And  spurns  the  plain  that  aims  at  other  ends; 


English  Literatiire.  397 

Till  carried  to  excess  in  each  domain, 
This  favorite  good  begets  peculiar  pain." 

We  seem  to  be  remote  from  the  new  spirit  of  poetry 
as  we  read  this  rhymed  thesis  with  which  the  simple- 
hearted,  childlike,  merry  young  Irishman  made  his  ap- 
pearance as  a  poet.  In  order  to  be  esteemed  he  sup- 
pressed all  naturalness  and  simplicity,  and  posed  for  a 
philosopher,  with  a  full  command  of  rhetorical  devices. 
The  "Deserted  Village"  (1769),  four  years  later,  sounds 
another  note.  The  poem  has  delighted  nearly  all  its 
readers,  for  with  exactness  of  form,  and  a  form,  too,  gen- 
erally associated  in  our  minds  with  artificiality,  it  has 
pathos,  simplicity,  love  of  nature,  and  little  touches  that 
no  one  can  be  wholly  insensible  to.  Indeed,  it  is  a  most 
fortunate  thing  for  us  that  the  heroic  verse,  which  has 
been  so  unjustly  decried,  contains  a  poem  so  full  of  the 
very  beauties  which  are  often  hastily  denied  it. 

It  also  bears  marks  of  the  influence  of  his  romantic 
contemporaries — e.  g. : 

"  Through  torrid  tracts  with  fainting  steps  they  go, 
Whe7-e  wild  Altama  murmurs  to  ikcir  ivoe.^' 

And, 

"  Farewell,  and  0  !  where'er  thy  voice  be  tried. 
On  Torno^s  cHjfs,  or  Pamhaniarca^ s  sidc.^'' 

Yet,  while  the  poem  is  full  of -the  sentimentality  which 
was  making  its  appearance  in  literature,  it  is  amusing  to 
see  how  wholly  unconscious  Goldsmith's  reason  was  of 
the  changes  in  men's  thoughts  and  feelings.  An  appeal 
to  his  inquiry  into  "The  Present  State  of  Polite  Learn- 
ing" (1759)  may  be  hardly  fair,  because  an  appeal  to  a 
poet's  arguments  in  support  of  his  views  is  tolerably  cer- 
tain to  be  misleading  ;  but  here  we  have  Goldsmith's 
views  expressed  very  clearly.  "  Rousseau,  of  Geneva  ;" 
he  says,  '*  a  professed  man-hater  ;  or,  more  properly  speak- 


398  English  Literature. 

ing,  a  philosopher  enraged  with  one  half  of  mankind,  be- 
cause they  unavoidably  make  the  other  half  unhajjpy. 
Such  sentiments  are  generally  the  result  of  much  good 
nature  and  little  experience."  But  more  striking  than 
this  is  the  following ;  he  is  speaking  of  the  writers  of 
France,  who,  he  says,  "have  also  of  late  fallen  into  a 
method  of  considering  every  part  of  art  and  science  as 
arising  from  simjjle  principles.  The  success  of  Mon- 
tesquieu, and  one  or  two  more,  has  induced  all  the  sub- 
ordinate ranks  of  genius  into  vicious  imitation.  To  this 
end  they  turn  to  our  view  that  side  of  the  subject  which 
contributes  to  support  their  hypothesis,  while  the  objec- 
tions are  generally  passed  over  in  silence.  Thus  one 
universal  system  rises  from  a  partial  representation  of 
the  question,  a  whole  is  concluded  from  a  part,  a  book 
appears  entirely  new,  and  the  fancy-built  fabric  is  styled 
for  a  short  time  very  ingenious.  In  this  manner  we  have 
seen,  of  late,  almost  every  subject  in  morals,  natural  his- 
tory, economy,  and  commerce  treated  ;  subjects  naturally 
proceeding  on  many  principles,  and  some  even  opposite  to 
each  other,  are  all  taught  to  proceed  along  the  line  of 
systematic  simplicity,  and  continue,  like  other  agreeable 
falsehoods,  extremely  pleasing  till  they  are  detected." 

I  quote  this  long  passage,  not  for  the  purpose  of  cast- 
ing scorn  on  poor  Goldsmith's  hack-work  —  for  to  con- 
demn him  for  faulty  ])hilosophy  would  be  scarcely  wiser 
than  condemning  Montesquieu  for  his  bad  poems — but  to 
show  the  average  conservative  view  of  Goldsmith's  time 
regarding  the  one  great  step  which  science  was  then 
making  towards  simplification.  Let  us  not  exult  too 
loudly  :  it  is  still  possible  to  find  mixed  companies  in 
which  there  are  people  who  shudder  if  they  hear  Dar- 
icinism  mentioned,  and  who  have  prejudices  against  the 
word  evolution.     Let  us  call  it  growth,  and  no  one  will  bo 


English  Literature.  399 

pained  ;  it  was  this  notion  of  growth  that  he  found  fault 
with  for  being  too  simjjle.  Yet  no  one  reads  Goldsmitli 
for  his  views  on  any  subject.  They  were  as  little  a  part 
of  him  as  was  his  wig,  and  like  that  article  they  bore 
marks  of  conventionality.  In  his  "  Vicar  of  Wakefield," 
for  instance,  there  is  no  faintest  trace  of  the  pompousness 
that  lay  heavy  on  the  conservative  part  of  his  generation. 
Goldsmith  is  as  simple,  as  winning,  as  delightful  as  a 
child,  and  his  book  is  consequently  one  of  the  master- 
pieces of  English  literature.  The  fact  that  it  described 
the  life  of  a  humble  family,  with  ordinary  incidents,  and 
especially  that  it  described  the  Vicar's  career  in  a  prison, 
excited  some  opposition.  The  book  was  looked  upon  as 
"low"  by  the  fashionable  critics.*  NoAvhere,  perhaps, 
did  it  have  more  influence  than  on  the  Continent,  and 
especially  in  Germany.  How  much  Goethe  was  moved 
by  it  when,  four  years  later,  Herder  read  him  the  Ger- 
man translation,  we  may  see  in  his  "  Wahrheit  und  Dich- 
tung,"  bk.  X.  Yet,  while  the  story  remains  unrivalled, 
we  may  notice  that  it  belongs  in  many  respects  to  the 
period  in  which  it  was  written.  In  execution  it  is  a  model 
for  all  time  ;  in  plan  and  aim  it  belongs  to  its  own  day. 
Its  idyllic  tone  was  essentially  that  which  we  frequent- 
ly observe  in  literature  before  the  French  Revolution. 
There  are  the  mutterings  of  that  storm,  too,  in  the  de- 
nunciations of  the  rich  which  are  to  be  found  in  the 

*  Goldsmith  himself  said  in  the  preface :  "  In  this  age  of  opulence  and 
refinement  whom  can  such  a  character  please  ?  Such  as  are  fond  of  high 
life  will  turn  with  disdain  from  the  simplicity  of  his  country  fireside," 
etc. 

Mr.  Wm.  Black,  in  his  "  Goldsmith  "  (English  Men  of  Letters  Series),  says, 
*'  Mme.  Riccoboni,  to  whom  Burke  had  sent  the  book,  wrote  to  Garrick, 
"  Le  plaidoyer  en  faveur  des  voleurs,  des  petits  larrons,  des  gens  de  mau- 
vaises  moeurs,  est  fort  61oigne  de  me  plaire.'  " 


40O  Jinglish  Literature. 

novel,  and  the  appeal  for  sounder  conduct  [vide  chapters 
xix.  and  xxvii.). 

Notice,  too,  the  literary  taste  of  the  day  (chap,  ix.) : 
"The  two  ladies  thrcAV  my  girls  quite  into  the  shade; 
for  they  would  talk  of  nothing  but  high  life  and  high- 
lived  company  ;  with  other  fashionable  topics,  such  as 
pictures,  taste,  Shakspeare,  and  the  musical  glasses." 
And  (chap,  xviii.),  "As  I  was  pretty  much  unacquainted 
with  the  present  state  of  the  stage,  I  demanded  who  were 
the  present  theatrical  writers  in  vogue,  who  were  the 
Di-ydens  and  Otways  of  the  day — '  I  fancy,  sir,'  cried  the 
player,  '  few  of  our  modern  dramatists  would  think  them- 
selves much  honoured  by  being  compared  to  the  writers 
you  mention.  Dryden  and  Rowe's  manner,  sir,  are  quite 
out  of  fashion  ;  our  taste  has  gone  back  a  whole  century  ; 
Fletcher,  Ben  Jonson,  and  all  the  plays  of  Shakspeare, 
are  the  only  things  that  go  down  !'  '  How,'  cried  I, '  is  it 
possible  the  present  age  can  be  pleased  with  that  anti-. 
quated  dialect,  that  obsolete  humour,  those  overcharged 
characters,  which  abound  in  the  works  you  mention  ?' 
'  Sir,'  returned  my  companion,  '  the  public  think  nothing 
about  dialect,  or  humour,  or  character  ;  for  that  is  none 
of  their  business,  they  only  go  to  be  amused,  and  find 
themselves  happy  when  they  can  enjoy  a  pantomime, 
under  the  sanction  of  Jonson's  or  Shakspeare's  name.' 
'  So  then,  I  suppose,'  cried  I, '  that  our  modern  dramatists 
are  rather  imitators  of  Shakspeare  than  of  nature.'  'To 
say  the  truth,'  returned  my  companion,  'I  don't  know 
that  they  imitate  anything  at  all ;  nor  indeed  does  the 
public  require  it  of  them  :  it  is  not  the  composition  of 
the  piece,  but  the  number  of  starts  and  attitudes  that 
may  be  introduced  into  it,  that  starts  applause.' " 

Tliis  Shaksperian  revival,  which  was  furthered  as  much 
by  Garrick  as  by  any  one  man,  did  but  little  in  the  way 


English  Literature.  401 

of  bringing  valuable  additions  to  the  dramatic  literature 
of  England,  but  it  shows  that  the  interest  in  the  neglect- 
ed past  was  spreading  further  and  further.  We  have  seen 
that  there  was  an  edition  of  Spenser  in  1715,  followed 
by  another  thirty  years  later.  About  the  middle  of  the 
century,  Hawkins  reprinted  several  old  plays.  Johnson 
himself  brought  out  his  edition  of  Shakspere  in  1765, 
And  in  the  Adventurer  we  find  Warton  freely  discussing 
the  works  of  the  Elizabethan  poets.  The  essays  of  V. 
Knox  (1777)  contain  touching  allusions  to  the  changes  in 
men's  tastes,  echoes  of  Dr.  Johnson's  style  and  opinion. 
Thus  (No.  XV.):  "There  are  several  books  very  popular 
in  the  present  age,  among  the  youthful  and  the  inexperi- 
enced, which  have  a  sweetness  that  palls  on  the  taste,  and 
a  grandeur  that  swells  to  a  bloated  turgidity.  Such  are 
the  writings  of  some  modern  Germans.  'The  Death  of 
Abel,'*  is  generally  read,  and  i^ref erred  by  many  to  all 
the  productions  of  Greece,  Rome,  and  England.  The 
success  of  this  work  has  given  rise  to  others  on  the  same 
plan,  inferior  to  this  in  its  real  merits,  and  labouring  un- 
der the  same  fault  of  redundant  decoration.  What  others 
may  feel,  I  know  not  ;  but  I  would  no  more  be  obliged 
to  read  the  works  of  Gesner  repeatedly,  than  to  make  a 
frequent  meal  on  the  honey-comb."  Again  (No.  xlvii.), 
"  The  antiquarian  spirit,  which  was  once  confined  to  in- 
quiries concerning  the  manners,  the  buildings,  the  records, 
and  the  coins  of  the  ages  that  preceded  us,  has  now  ex- 
tended itself  to  those  poetical  compositions  which  were 
popular  among  our  forefathers,  but  which  have  gradually 
sunk  into  oblivion  through  the  decay  of  language,  and 
the  prevalence  of  a  correct  and  polished  taste.  Books 
printed  in  the  black  letter  are  sought  for  with  the  same 

*  Numerous  editions  in  England,  one  with  Stothard's  plates ;  and  many 
in  Franca 


402  English  Literature. 

avidity  with  wliicli  the  English  antiquary  peruses  a  mon- 
umental inscription,  or  treasures  up  a  Saxon  piece  of 
money.  The  popular  ballad,  composed  by  some  illiterate 
minstrel,  and  which  has  been  handed  down  by  tradition 
for  several  centuries,  is  rescued  from  the  hands  of  the 
vulgar,  to  obtain  a  place  in  the  collection  of  the  man  of 
taste.  Verses,  which  a  few  years  past  were  thought 
worthy  the  attention  of  children  only,  or  of  the  lowest 
and  rudest  orders,  are  now  admired  for  that  artless  sim- 
plicity, which  once  obtained  the  name  of  coarseness  and 
vulgarity.  .  .  .  Every  lover  of  poetry  is  pleased  with  the 
judicious  selections  of  Percy,  though  he  gives  himself 
little  concern  about  dates.  .  .  .  The  more  antiquarian 
taste  in  poetry,  or  the  admiration  of  had  poetry  merely 
because  it  is  ancient,  is  certainly  absurd.  It  is  more  dif- 
ficult to  discover  the  meaning  of  many  of  our  old  poets, 
disguised  as  it  is  in  an  obsolete  and  uncouth  phraseology, 
than  to  read  an  elegant  Greek  or  Latin  author.  Such 
study  is,  indeed,  not  unfrequently  like  raking  in  a  dunghill 
for  pearls,  and  gaining  the  labour  only  for  one's  pains. 

"  Our  earlier  poets,  many  of  whose  names  are  deservedly 
forgotten,  seem  to  have  thought  that  rhyme  was  poetry  ; 
and  even  this  constituent  grace  they  applied  with  ex- 
treme negligence.  It  was,  however,  good  enough  for  its 
readers  ;  ...  it  has  had  its  day,  and  the  antiquary  must 
not  despise  us,  if  we  cannot  pursue  it  with  patience.  He 
who  delights  in  all  such  reading  as  is  never  read,  may  de- 
rive some  pleasure  from  the  singularity  of  his  taste  ;  but 
he  ought  still  to  respect  the  judgnumt  of  mankind,  which 
has  consigned  to  oblivion  the  works  he  admires.  While 
he  pores  unmolested  on  Chaucer,  Gower,  Lydgate,  and 
Occleve,  let  him  not  censure  our  obstinacy  in  adhering  to 
Homer,  Virgil,  Milton,  and  Pope. 

"  In  perusing  the  antiquated  pages  of  our  English  bards, 


English  Literature.  403 

we  sometimes  find  a  passage  which  has  comparative  merit, 
and  which  shines  with  the  greater  lustre,  because  it  is 
surrounded  with  deformity.  ...  It  is  true,  that  those 
old  ballads,  which  are  in  the  mouths  of  peasants  on  both 
sides  the  Tweed,  have  something  in  them  irresistibly  cap- 
tivating. Vulgar,  coarse,  inelegant,  they  yet  touch  the 
heart.  .  .  .  Addison  first  gained  them  the  notice  of  schol- 
ars, by  his  praises  of  '  Chevy  Chase,' "  etc.  The  whole 
essay  is  worthy  of  attention. 

Knox,  No.  cxxix.,  also  says:  "  I  think  it  is  not  diflicult  to 
perceive,  that  the  admirers  of  English  poetry  are  divided 
into  two  parties.  The  objects  of  their  love  are,  perhaps, 
of  equal  beauty,  though  they  greatly  differ  in  their  air, 
their  dress,  the  turn  of  their  features,  and  their  complex- 
ion. On  one  side  are  the  lovers  and  imitators  of  Spenser 
and  Milton  ;  and  on  the  other,  those  of  Dryden,  Boileau, 
and  Pope."  In  the  same  paper  Knox  regrets  that  blank- 
verse  was  the  object  of  "an  unreasonable  prejudice,"  and 
that  Dr.  Johnson  should  have  treated  "  the  illustrious  Gray 
with  singular  harshness,  in  a  work  which  contains  very 
candid  accounts  of  a  Sprat  and  a  Yalden,  a  Duke  and  a 
Broome."  Thus  it  is  evident  that  the  condition  of  things 
was  pretty  well  understood  at  the  time.  Indeed,  we 
should  naturally  expect  that  it  must  have  been  so,  just  as 
we  know  that  the  lightning  never  flashes  in  a  clear  sky. 
The  clouds  gather  with  greater  or  less  celerity,  and  with 
more  or  less  remote  muttering  ;  it  is  this  distant  forebod- 
ing that  we  are  now  studying. 

Another  excellent  proof  that  a  change  was  impending 
is  the  unanimity  of  the  conservative  people  in  asserting 
that  a  change  would  be  dangerous  if  it  were  not  fortu- 
nately impossible.  This  state  of  mind  found  expression 
in  the  writings  and  utterances  of  Dr.  Johnson.  Inasmuch 
as  his  wit  made  his  sayings  memorable,  he  is  now  often 


404  English  Literature. 

looked  upon  as  a  mere  creature  of  prejudice  ;  and  often 
we  take  for  a  simple  expression  of  personal  whim  what 
was  simply  the  best  statement  of  the  thought  of  his  time — 
not,  of  course,  of  all  the  thought,  but  of  what  we  may  call 
the  conservative  thought  of  his  time.  He  led  his  contem- 
poraries, but,  to  make  a  homely  comparison,  he  led  it  as 
the  foremost  of  the  flock — foremost,  to  be  sure,  yet  one 
of  the  flock.  There  is  scarcely  one  of  his  views  which 
has  not  been  riddled  by  later  opinion.  All  that  he  held 
dearest  has  been  destroyed,  and  the  process  began  even 
before  he  seemed  to  have  made  irrevocably  fast  the  laws 
of  literature.  Thus  (Boswell,  July  9, 1763),  "  I  mentioned 
to  him  that  Dr.  Adam  Smith,  in  his  lectures  upon  composi- 
tion, when  I  studied  under  him  in  the  College  of  Glasgow, 
had  maintained  the  same  opinion  strenuously,  and  I  re- 
peated some  of  his  arguments. — Johnson:  'Sir,  I  was 
once  in  company  with  Smith,  and  we  did  not  take  to  each 
other ;  but  had  I  known  that  he  loved  rhyme  as  much  as 
you  tell  me  he  does,  I  should  have  hugged  him.' "  He 
spoke  with  intelligence  about  Thomson,  saying  :  "  His  is 
one  of  the  works  in  which  blank  verse  seems  properly 
used.  .  .  .  His  description  of  extended  scenes  and  general 
effects  bring  before  us  the  whole  magnificence  of  nature, 
whether  pleasing  or  dreadful.  The  gaiety  of  Spring,  the 
splendour  of  Summer,  the  tranquillity  of  Autumn,  and  the 
horror  of  Winter,  take  in  their  turns  possession  of  the 
mind.  The  poet  leads  us  through  the  appearances  of 
things  as  they  are  successively  varied  by  the  vicissitudes 
of  the  year,  and  imparts  to  us  so  much  of  their  enthusiasm, 
that  our  thoughts  expand  with  his  imagery  and  kindle 
with  his  sentiments.  .  .  .  His  diction  is  in  the  highest  de- 
gree florid  and  luxuriant,  such  as  may  be  said  to  be  to  his 
images  and  thoughts  'both  their  lustre  and  their  shade;' 
such  as  invests  them  with  splendour,  through  which,  per- 


English  Literature.  40$ 

haps,  they  are  not  always  easily  discerned.  It  is  too  ex- 
uberant, and  sometimes  may  be  charged  with  filling  the 
ear  more  than  the  mind."  In  his  preface  to  his  edition  of 
Shakspere  (1765),  Dr.  Johnson  puts  away  the  notion  of 
the  unities  into  the  lumber-chamber,  nearly  thirty  years 
after  he  had  written  his  play,  in  which  he  had  closely  ob- 
served them.*  Yet  about  Milton  he  could  write  strangely. 
We  feel  here  that  we  are  listening  to  a  man  with  whom  it 
is  impossible  to  sympathize,  and  one  who  is  moved  by 
prejudice.  It  is  not  hard  to  find  sufficient  ground  for  his 
prejudice,  from  what  we  have  seen  of  the  way  in  which 
Milton  was  regarded  by  those  of  Johnson's  contempora- 
ries whom  he  despised,  and  w^hom  he  lashed  over  Milton's 
back.  Even  more  violent  was  his  onslaught  on  the  reviv- 
ing interest  in  ballad  literature  and  on  Ossian: 

"  Mr.  James  Macpherson, — I  received  your  foolish  and 
impudent  letter.  Any  violence  ofi:"ered  to  me  I  shall  do 
my  best  to  repel,  and  what  I  cannot  do  for  myself,  the 
law  shall  do  for  me.  I  hope  I  shall  never  be  deterred 
from  detecting  what  I  think  a  cheat  by  the  menaces  of  a 
ruffian.  What  would  you  have  me  retract?  I  thought 
your  book  an  imposture  ;  I  think  it  an  imposture  still. 
For  this  opinion  I  have  given  my  reasons  to  the  public, 
which  I  here  dare  you  to  refute.  Your  rage  I  defy.  Your 
abilities,  since  your  '  Homer,'  f  are  not  so  formidable  ;  and 

*  So  that  even  before  Lessing  he  drove  out  the  unities ;  but  by  this  time 
they  had  no  sucli  real  existence  in  England  as  they  had  on  the  Continent. 
Lillo  and  his  followers  had  slain  them.  Johnson  wrote  about  Shakspere, 
however,  in  the  old-fashioned  way  when  he  blamed  him  for  omitting  "  op- 
portunities of  instructing  or  delighting,"  and  for  making  "  no  just  distri- 
bution of  good  or  evil." 

f  A  translation  of  Homer  into  English  prose  (2  vols.  4to.,  1773;  2d 
ed.  the  same  year).  This  was  an  attempt  to  work  over  Homer  in  the 
rhythm  and  style  of  Ossian.     The  book  was  generally  derided. 


4o6  English  Literature. 

what  I  hear  of  your  morals  inclines  me  to  pay  regard  not 
to  what  you  shall  say,  but  to  what  you  shall  prove.  You 
may  print  this  if  you  will."  So  he  wrote,  and  "he  pro- 
vided himself  with  a  weapon  both  of  the  defensive  and 
offensive  kind.  It  was  an  oak-plant  of  a  tremendous  size  ; 
a  plant,  I  say,  and  not  a  shoot  or  branch,  for  it  had  a  root, 
which Ijeing  trimmed  to  the  size  of  a  large  orange,  became 
the  head  of  it.  Its  height  was  uj^ward  of  six  feet,  and 
from  about  an  inch  in  diameter  at  the  lower  end,  increased 
to  near  three  ;  this  he  kept  in  his  bedchamber,  so  near  the 
chair  in  which  he  constantly  sat  as  to  be  within  reach." 
This  stick,  which  overshadows  the  one  which  Ambrose 
Philips  hung  up  at  Buttons's  to  beat  Pope  with,  was  as 
powerless  against  Ossian  as  rods  are  when  used  in  the  way 
of  disseminating  a  love  of  literature  ;  and  Ossian,  as  we 
shall  shortly  notice,  swept  over  continental  Europe  like  a 
fog  from  the  northern  seas. 

In  fact,  as  Hettner  says.  Dr.  Johnson's  roots  ran  back  to 
the  time  of  Queen  Anne  ;  he  inherited  the  opinions  of  that 
time,  and  he  lived  long  enough  to  see  in  a  flourishing  con- 
dition many  opinions  that  were  distinctly  opposed  to  the 
earlier  -well-established  principles.  Thus,  besides  his  im- 
mortally unread  tragedy,  he  wrote  his  essays  after  the 
model  of  the  Spectator,  and  in  the  Rambler  gave  the  Eng- 
lish people  many  curious  sermons.  Remember,  however, 
that  in  so  doing  he  took  the  only  method  known  of  reach- 
ing the  public  ;  he  was  not  trying  to  make  himself  over 
into  a  Queen  Anne  writer  in  the  deliberate  way  in  which 
people  now  build  Queen  Anne  houses.  Let  us  take  the 
Rambler,  and  see  Dr.  Johnson  laying  down  the  law  for 
our  ancestors  in  the  middle  of  the  last  century.  As  Mr. 
Leslie  Stephen  puts  it :  "  With  Shakespeare,  or  Sir  Thom- 
as Browne,  or  Jeremy  Taylor,  or  Milton,  man  is  contem- 
plated in  his  relations  to  the  universe  ;  he  is  in  presence 


English  Literature.  407 

of  eternity  and  infinity  ;  life  is  a  brief  dream  ;  we  are 
ephemeral  actors  in  a  vast  drama  ;  heaven  and  hell  are 
behind  the  veil  of  phenomena  ;  at  every  step  our  friends 
vanish  into  the  vast  abyss  of  ever-present  mystery.  To 
all  such  thoughts  the  writers  of  the  eighteenth  century 
seemed  to  close  their  eyes  as  resolutely  as  possible.  They 
do  not,  like  Sir  Thomas  Browne,  delight  to  lose  themselves 
in  an  Oh  !  Altitudo  !  or  to  snatch  a  solemn  joy  from  the 
giddiness  which  follows  a  steady  gaze  into  the  infinite. 
The  greatest  men  among  them,  a  Swift  or  a  Johnson, 
have  indeed  a  sense — perhaps  a  really  stronger  sense  than 
Browne  or  Taylor — of  the  pettiness  of  our  lives  and  the 
narrow  limits  of  our  knowledge.  No  great  man  could 
ever  be  without  it.  But  the  awe  of  the  infinite  and  the 
unseen  does  not  induce  them  to  brood  over  the  mysterious, 
and  find  utterance  for  bewildered  musings  on  the  inscru- 
table enigma. 

"It  is  felt  only  in  a  certain  habitual  sadness  which 
clouds  their  whole  tone  of  thought.  They  turn  their 
backs  on  the  infinite,  and  abandon  the  effort  at  a  solution. 
Their  eyes  are  fixed  on  the  world  around  them,  and  they 
regard  as  foolish  and  presumptuous  any  one  who  dares  to 
contemplate  the  great  darkness.  The  expression  of  this 
sentiment  in  literature  is  a  marked  disposition  to  turn 
aside  from  pure  speculation,  combined  with  a  deep  inter- 
est in  moral  and  social  laws.  The  absence  of  any  deeper 
speculative  ground  makes  the  immediate  practical  ques- 
tions of  life  all  the  more  interesting.  We  know  not  what 
we  are,  nor  whither  we  are  going,  nor  whence  we  come  ; 
but  we  can,  by  the  help  of  common  sense,  discover  a  suf- 
ficient share  of  moral  maxims  for  our  guidance  in  life,  and 
we  can  analyze  human  passions,  and  discover  what  are  the 
moving  forces  of  society,  without  going  back  to  first  prin- 
ciples.    Knowledge  of  human  nature,  as  it  actually  pre- 


4o8  English  Literature. 

sented  itself  in  the  shifting  scene  before  them,  and  a  vivid 
appreciation  of  the  importance  of  the  moral  law,  are  the 
staple  of  the  best  literature  of  the  time.  As  ethical  spec- 
ulation was  prominent  in  the  philosophy,  the  enforcement 
of  ethical  principles  is  the  task  of  those  who  were  inclined 
to  despise  philosophy.  When  a  creed  is  dying,  the  impor- 
tance of  preserving  the  moral  law  naturally  becomes  a 
pressing  consideration  with  all  strong  natures"  (English 
Thought,"  ii.  370,  371). 

This  intelligent  statement  does  not  cover  all  the  ground, 
because,  for  one  thing,  the  causes  which  lead  to  the  differ- 
ences between  two  different  periods  of  civilization  are 
enormously  complex,  and  it  is  hard,  if  not  actually  im- 
possible, for  any  one  observer  to  see  them  all.  Yet  the  de- 
cay of  faith,  and  the  consequent  need  of  enforcing  moral 
teaching,  do  not  fully  explain  the  alteration  in  men's 
minds  ;  enthusiasm  died  out,  because,  from  its  very  nat- 
ure, it  cannot  last  long,  and  the  task  that  lay  before  the 
people  of  the  last  century  was  the  establishment  of  civili- 
'  zation,  and  this  was  a  practical  question.  The  Renaissance 
was  of  the  nature  of  the  conquest  of  unknown  lands,  and 
its  work  was  done  with  the  fire  and  enthusiasm  that  con- 
quest requires ;  in  the  last  century,  these  newly  con- 
quered regions  had  to  be  brought  under  the  municipal 
law,  and  this  is  a  process  in  which  enthusiasm  is  apt  to 
languish. 

Where  Addison  spoke«with  grace  and  lightness,  John- 
son si>oke  with  pomp  and  elaboration,  and  with  a  certain 
despairing  melancholy  ;  but  the  main  effort  of  the  two 
men  was  the  same.  AVe  do  not  nowadays  read  the  Ram- 
bler with  delight  ;  in  fact,  we  do  not  read  it  at  all.  What 
we  enjoj'  in  the  Spectator  is  not  its  moral  lessons,  which 
were  dear  to  those  for  whom  they  were  written.  We  en- 
joy the  eternally  delightful  humour  with  which  Addison 


Englhh  Literature.  409 

sketched  certain  characters,  but  Johnson's  humour  is  less 
easy.     "  Criticism,"  he  tells  us  {Rambler,  No.  16), 

"...  was  the  eldest  daughter  of  Labour  and  of  Truth ;  she  was,  at  her 
liirth,  committed  to  the  care  of  Justice,  and  brouglit  up  by  her  in  the 
Falace  of  Wisdom.  Being  soon  distinguished  by  the  celestials,  for  her 
uncommon  qualities,  she  was  appointed  the  Governess  of  Fancy,  and  era- 
powered  to  beat  time  to  the  chorus  of  the  Muses,  when  they  sung  before 
the  throne  of  Jupiter." 

No.  74  :  "  He  that  gives  himself  up  to  his  own  fancy,  and  converses  with 
none  but  such  as  he  hires  to  lull  liiui  on  the  down  of  absolute  authority, 
to  soothe  him  with  obsequiousness,  and  regale  him  with  flattery,  soon 
grows  too  slothful  for  the  labour  of  contest,  too  tender  for  the  asperity  of 
contradiction,  and  too  delicate  for  the  coarseness  of  truth ;  a  little  op- 
position offends,  a  little  restraint  enrages,  and  a  little  difficulty  perplexes 
him,"  etc. 

No.  126 :  "  Sir, — As  you  propose  to  extend  your  regard  to  the  minute- 
ness of  decency,  as  well  as  to  the  dignity  of  science,  I  cannot  forbear  to 
lay  before  you  a  mode  of  persecution  by  which  I  have  been  exiled  to 
taverns  and  coffee-houses,  and  deterred  from  entering  the  doors  of  my 
friends. 

"Among  the  ladies  who  please  themselves  with  splendid  furniture,  or 
elegant  entertainment,  it  is  a  practice  very  common  to  ask  every  guest 
how  he  likes  the  carved  work  of  the  cornice,  or  the  figures  of  the  tapestry ; 
the  china  at  the  table,  or  the  plate  on  the  sideboard ;  and  on  all  occasions 
to  inquire  his  opinion  of  their  judgment  and  their  choice.  Melania  has 
laid  her  new  watch  in  the  window  nineteen  times,  that  she  may  desire  me 
to  look  upon  it.  Calista  has  an  art  of  dropping  her  snuff-box  by  drawing 
out  her  handkerchief  that  when  I  pick  it  up  1  may  admire  it;  and  Ful- 
gentia  has  conducted  me  by  mistake  into  the  wrong  room,  at  every  visit  I 
have  paid  since  her  picture  was  put  into  a  new  frame." 

Certainly  Dr.  Johnson  is  not  always  associated  in  our 
minds  with  this  airy  satire  of  social  foibles,  and  it  must 
be  acknowledged  that  much  of  the  Hamhler  is  but  a  cold 
imitation  of  the  graceful  lightness  of  much  of  the  Spectator. 
No  greater  tribute  could  be  paid  to  Addison  and  Steele 
than  the  fact  that  Dr.  Johnson,  in  order  to  reach  the  pub- 
lic, had  to  follow,  heavily  shod  as  he  was  with   all  the 

18 


410  English  Literature. 

learning  and  conservative  prejudice  of  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury, in  their  light  footsteps.  He  maintains  their  most 
firmly  rooted  opinions  with  great  vigor.  His  own  method 
•reads  like  a  petrifaction  of  their  forms  of  expression.  In 
No.  32  we  are  told,  or  at  least  our  ancestors  were  told, 
that  "  to  oppose  the  devastations  of  Famine,  who  scat- 
tered the  ground  everywhere  with  carcasses,  Labour  came 
down  upon  earth."  In  No.  38,  that  "  whosoever  shall  look 
heedf ully  upon  those  who  are  eminent  for  their  riches, 
will  not  think  their  condition  such  that  he  should  hazard 
his  quiet,  and  much  less  his  virtue  to  obtain  it,"  In  No. 
41,  that  "  we  owe  to  memory  not  only  the  increase  of  our 
knowledge,  and  our  progress  in  rational  inquiries,  but 
many  other  intellectual  pleasures."  It  is  not  necessary  to 
quote  the  harrowing  tale,  in  No.  73,  which  contains  this 
useful  lesson  :  "  Let  no  man  from  this  time  suffer  his  fe- 
licity to  depend  on  the  death  of  his  aunt,"  It  should  be 
said  in  justice,  however,  that  this  phrase  is  more  than  half 
ironical.  Johnson's  views  on  literature,  as  expressed  in 
the  Rambler,  were  far  more  rigid  than  those  of  his  great 
predecessors.  We  have  seen  with  what  contempt  he  spoke 
of  those  who  cared  for  antique  poetry.  Addison  was  con- 
tinually getting  out  of  the  pulpit  to  praise  something 
which  his  taste  told  him  was  good,  Johnson,  on  the  other 
hand,  brought  all  his  wit  and  learning  to  crush  every  at- 
temj)t  at  novelty.  Science,  too,  fared  no  better  at  his  hands 
than  did  romantic  poetry.  Thus  in  the  liamhler,  No.  24  : 
"  When  a  man  employs  himself  upon  i-emote  and  unneces- 
sary subjects,  and  wastes  his  life  upon  questions  which 
cannot  be  resolved,  and  of  which  the  solution  would  con- 
duce very  little  to  the  advancement  of  happiness  ;  when 
he  lavishes  his  hours  in  calculating  the  weight  of  the 
terraqueous  globe,  or  in  adjusting  successive  systems  of 
worlds  beyond   the  reach   of   the  telescope  ;  he  may  be 


English  Literature.  41 1 

very  properly  recalled  from  his  excursions  by  thig  precept 
[know  thyself],  and  reminded  that  there  is  a  nearer  being 
with  which  it  is  his  duty  to  be  more  acquainted,  and  from 
which  his  attention  has  been  withheld  by  studies,  to  which 
he  has  no  other  motive  than  vanity  or  curiosity."  There- 
upon he  proceeds  to  draw  the  character  of  a  scientific 
man  whom  he  brands  with  the  name  of  Gelidus.  This 
worthless  person  displays  the  harm  wrought  by  science, 
by  being  "  insensible  to  every  spectacle  of  distress  and 
unmoved  by  the  loudest  call  of  social  nature."  It  is, 
perhaps,  worthy  of  a  moment's  notice  that  the  objection 
nowadays  to  men  like  the  unhappy  Gelidus  is,  that  they 
are,  if  anything,  too  unpractical,  and  are  prone  to  exhibit 
a  sentimental  sympathy  with  the  sufferings  of  others. 

Johnson  also  lacked  sympathy  with  collectors,  as  he 
showed  in  No.  82,  which  contains  an  imaginary  confession 
of  one  of  them  :  "  I  now  turned  my  thoughts  to  exotics 
and  antiquities.  Having  been  always  a  lover  of  geography, 
I  determined  to  collect  the  maps  drawn  in  rude  and  bar- 
barous times,  before  any  regular  surveys,  or  just  observa- 
tions." "  I  allowed  my  tenants  to  pay  their  rents  in  but- 
terflies, till  I  had  exhausted  the  papilionaceous  tribes.  I 
then  directed  them  to  the  pursuit  of  other  animals,  and 
obtained  by  this  easy  method,  most  of  the  grubs  and  in- 
sects, which  land,  air,  or  water,  can  supply.  I  have  three 
species  of  earthworms  not  known  to  the  naturalists,  have 
discovered  a  new  ephemera,  and  can  show  four  wasps  that 
were  taken  torpid  in  their  native  quarters."  One  tenant 
brought  him  only  "  two  horse-flies  and  those  of  little  more 
than  the  common  size  ;  and  I  was  upon  the  brink  of  seiz- 
ing for  arrears,  when  his  good  fortune  threw  a  white  mole 
in  his  way,  for  which  he  was  not  only  forgiven  but  re- 
warded." He  collected  marbles  from  remote  regions, 
curiosities,  a  fur  cap  of  the  Czar  and  a  boot  of  Charles  of 


412  English  Literature. 

Sweden.  For  the  sake  of  the  Harleian  collection  "  I  mort- 
gaged my  land,  and  purchased  thirty  medals,  which  I  could 
never  find  before ;"  and  now  he  is  ruined.  The  mere  cata- 
logue of  his  motley  tastes  seems  to  show  the  inaccuracy 
of  the  portrait,  which  may  well  be  a  caricature  of  Horace 
Walpole. 

And  again  in  No.  177,  Hirsutus  collects  books  in  black- 
letter  ;  Fen-atus,  copper  coins  ;  "  Cantilenus  turned  all  his 
thoughts  upon  old  ballads,  for  he  considered  them  as  the 
genuine  records  of  the  national  tastes.  He  offered  to  show 
me  a  copy  of  the  '  Children  in  the  Wood,'  which  he  firmly 
believed  to  be  of  the  first  edition,  and  by  the  help  of  which 
the  text  might  be  freed  from  corruptions,  if  this  age  of  bar- 
barity had  any  claim  to  such  favours  from  him."  Johnson's 
sole  consolation  is  that  these  people  were  capable  of  noth- 
ing better,  and  were  at  least  kept  out  of  active  mischief.* 

Let  us  remember,  however,  that  in  its  day  the  Mamhler 
was  far  from  popular.  Its  circulation  was  rather  less  than 
five  hundred  copies  ;  it  was  only  after  Johnson  had  be- 
come famous  that  they  were  much  read.  Ten  editions 
that  were  published  in  his  lifetime  made  up  for  the  earlier 
neglect  of  the  essays. f 

*  Johnson's  feeling  about  research  was  the  common  property  of  his  day, 
and  not  mere  personal  whim.  Compare  the  "  Dissertation  concerning  the 
Mva.  of  Ossian :"  "  Inquiries  into  the  antiquities  of  nations  afford  more 
pleasure  than  any  real  advantage  to  maniiind.  ...  It  is  tlien  [in  a  well- 
ordered  community]  historians  begin  to  write,  and  public  transactions  to 
be  worthy  remembrance." 

And  see  Dr.  Hugh  Blair's  remark,  in  his  "  Critical  Dissertation  on  the 
Poems  of  Ossian :"  "  History,  when  it  treats  of  remote  and  dark  ages,  is 
seldom  very  instructive.  The  beginnings  of  society  in  every  country  are 
involved  in  fabulous  confusion  ;  and  though  they  were  not,  they  would  fur- 
nish few  events  worth  recording."     See,  too,  Taller,  No.  216. 

f  Cumberland,  "  Memoirs  "  (Am.  ed.),  p.  183,  saj-s  :  "His  Ramblers  are 
in  everybody's  hands,  about  them  opinions  vary." 


Engliish  Literature.  413 

It  is  scarcely  fair  to  exhume  Johnson's  "  Irene"  to  show 
his  respect  for  the  models  of  his  day.  There  is  but  one 
opinion  jjossible  about  the  tragedy  ;  that  was  formed  a 
century  ago,  and  it  is  one  of  the  few  that  have  not  been 
revised,  but  it  is  not  generally  known,  perhaps,  how  very 
poor  the  play  really  is.     For  instance  : 

"  Leon.  Awake,  Demetrius,  from  this  dismal  dream, 
Sink  not  beneatli  imaginary  sorrows  ; 
Call  to  your  aid  your  courage,  and  your  wisdom  ; 
Think  on  the  sudden  change  of  human  scenes, 
Think  on  the  various  accidents  of  war ; 
Tliink  on  the  mighty  power  of  awful  virtue ; 
Think  on  that  Providence  that  guards  the  good." 

And,  in  the  next  scene  : 

"  Has  silence  pressed  her  seal  upon  his  lips? 
Does  adamantine  faith  invest  his  heart? 
Will  he  not  bend  beneath  a  tyrant's  frown  ? 
Will  he  not  melt  before  ambition's  fire? 
Will  he  not  soften  in  a  friend's  embrace 
Or  flow  dissolving  in  a  woman's  tears." 

Similar  three  and  four  barrelled  sentences  are  to  be  found 
in  almost  every  scene. 

The  "  Rasselas "  is,  in  form,  an  amplification  of  the 
Oriental  apologues  in  the  Spectator,  but  it  is  as  complete 
a  "  criticism  of  life  "  as  one  Avill  find  in  any  English  work 
of  the  time.  Johnson's  preface  to  his  Shakspere,  although, 
as  we  have  seen,  not  untinged  with  antique  notions,  was 
of  service  to  letters.  His  "  Lives  of  the  Poets  "  must  have 
had,  on  the  other  hand,  a  bad  influence.  His  unsympa- 
thetic treatment  of  Gray  and  his  lack  of  appreciation  of 
Milton  doubtless  affected  a  vast  number  of  readers.  It 
would  be  unfair  to  load  his  shoulders  with  all  the  bigotry 
with  which  the  English  nation  long  regarded  much  of  the 
work  of   foreigners ;    he  but   gave   exjjression   to    wide- 


414  English  Literature. 

spread  prejudices.  Yet  his  wit  and  his  authority  must 
have  strengthened  very  much  the  raw  English  prejudice 
against  the  great  French  writers  of  the  last  century, 
"  For  anything  I  can  see,  all  foreigners  are  fools,"  was 
one  of  his  remarks.  The  opinion  he  expressed  to  Boswell 
about  Rousseau  and  Voltaire  will  occur  to  every  one.  He 
told  Stockdale  that  Voltaire  and  D'Alembert  were  child- 
ish authors. 

In  looking  at  Johnson's  whole  value,  we  pardon  these 
eccentric  utterances,  and  it  is  by  no  means  a  complete  de- 
scription of  him  to  say  of  him  nothing  more  than  that  he 
encouraged  philistinism,  any  more  than  it  would  be  to  say 
that  he  was  hot-tempered,  but  the  discussion  of  his  many 
better -known  qualities  falls  outside  of  our  present  pur- 
pose. With  all  his  faults,  he  is  one  of  the  best-loved  men 
in  the  history  of  letters,  and  this  is  due,  not  to  his  writ- 
ings, but  to  the  faithful  record  which  Boswell  made  of 
the  evenings  when  the  great  man  folded  his  legs  and  had 
his  talk  out.  He  could  have  little  thought  that  posterity 
would  yawn  over  his  moral  writings,  sniff  at  his  witty 
criticisms,  and  coolly  respect  but  a  small  part  of  his  poe- 
try, leaving  the  rest  unread.  Once,  it  will  be  remembered, 
when  some  one  regretted  that  he  had  not  given  his  atten- 
tion to  law,  in  which  case  he  would  doubtless  have  risen 
to  be  Lord  High  Chancellor,  Johnson  impatiently  turned 
the  conversation,  evidently  filled  with  regret  that  he  had 
frittered  his  life  aAvay  with  so  little  to  show  for  it.  But 
what  is  the  ephemeral  reputation  of  a  Lord  High  Chan- 
cellor, which  scarcely  outlasts  that  of  an  actor  and  soon 
becomes  a  mere  vague  rumor,  with  that  which  Johnson 
now  holds  throughout  the  English-speaking  world?  We 
may  say  English-speaking,  because  people  of  other  nations 
repay  the  contempt  he  felt  for  their  grandfathers,  and  are 
far  from  understanding  why  we  like  him. 


Enijllnh  Literature.  415 

.  ■  Dr.  Johnson's  reputation,  then,  is  due  to  Boswell's  book. 
His  reputation  as  a  wit,  instead  of  being  simply  a  tradition, 
surviving,  like  Dryden's,  on  a  meagre  handful  of  anecdotes, 
and  kept  alive,  like  that  of  most  good  talkers,  by  having 
all  the  old  stories  of  centuries  fathered  on  him  alone — in- 
stead of  that,  I  say,  we  hear  him  as  he  lived  and  spoke. 
What  makes  Boswell's  "  Life  "  so  valuable  is  that  he  did 
not  iron  all  the  eccentricities  out  of  Johnson,  that  he  did 
not  file  and  polish  him  into  a  faultless  and  bloodless  hei'o, 
as  photographers  nowadays  burnish  from  our  portraits 
all  the  lines  which  time  and  experience  have  marked  upon 
our  face.*  Hannah  More  "  besought  his  [Boswell's]  ten- 
derness for  our  virtuous  and  most  revered  departed  friend, 
and  begged  he  would  mitigate  some  of  his  asperities.  He 
said,  roughly,  '  He  would  not  cut  off  his  claws,  nor  make  a 
tiger  a  cat  to  please  anybody.'  " 

Boswell's  reward  for  his  honesty  will  not  surprise 
thoughtful  people.  Inasmuch  as  he  put  down  instances 
of  his  own  folly  and  of  the  rebuffs  he  drew  from  John- 
son, it  has  been  the  fashion  to  decry  him  for  a  simpleton  ; 
but  few  sensible  men,  however,  have  given  so  much  pleas- 
ure to  an  ungrateful  world.  He  really  opens  the  door  for 
us  and  lets  us  overhear  Johnson  expressing  in  his  talk  all 
the  opposition  that  conservatives  felt  against  the  modern 
spirit  that  was  then  rising  on  every  hand.  There  were 
many  innovators  ;  for  society  had  become  very  complex, 
and  there  were  countless  influences  at  work  preparing  for 
the  second  Renaissance,  the  Romantic  movement. 

We  have  seen  in  what  way  much  of  the  new  spirit  grew, 

*  Perhaps  as  marked  an  instance  of  tlie  conventional  treatment  is  the 
authorized  life  of  Day,  the  author  of  "Sandford  and  Merton."  His  life,  as 
we  may  see  in  Miss  Edgeworth's  memoirs  of  her  father,  was  a  whirl  of 
eccentricity,  but  in  the  authorized  memoir  he  is  as  unreal  and  pallid  as  a 
bust  with  a  tojra  around  its  neck. 


4i6  Ehyliah  Literature. 

and  how  the  impending  political  revolution  was  antici- 
pated in  literature  by  the  deposition  of  crowned  heads 
from  their  pre-eminence  and  the  exaltation  of  the  citizen. 
We  have  seen  the  awakening  of  an  interest  in  the  past ; 
this  continued,  and  was  one  of  the  most  productive  of  the 
many  influences  at  work.  This  need  not  surprise  us  ;  the 
key  of  the  so-called  classical  method  was  the  imitation  of 
poets  of  acknowledged  merit.  Horace,  Seneca,Vergil,  had 
been  copied  and  recopied.  Gottsched  and  Bodmer  agreed 
in  urging  imitation  as  the  one  secret  of  success ;  they  dif- 
fered only  in  the  poets  they  suggested  for  models.  With 
time  there  had  grown  up  a  new  love  for  the  forgotten 
past,  and  once-neglected  poets  now  began  to  be  regarded 
as  authorities.  We  have  seen  how  echoes  of  Milton  re- 
verberated through  the  whole  century,  and  any  one  who 
turns  over  the  collections  of  verse  of  that  period  will  find 
numberless  attempts  to  reproduce  Spenser's  stanza.  Beat- 
tie  only  followed  what  was  already  a  fashion  when  he 
adopted  that  form  for  his  curious  refutation  of  infidelity 
in  the  "  Minstrel."  The  new  interest  in  Shakspere  was 
part  of  the  same  movement.* 

*  Lord  Lansdowne  made  over  tlie  "Merchant  of  Venice"  (1701)  with 
music ;  Otway,  "  Romeo  and  Juliet "  into  "  Caius  Marias  ;"  Gildon,  "  Meas- 
ure for  Measure;"  Gibber,  "Richard  the  Third,"  1700;  Dennis,  "Merry 
Wives,"  1702;  Levei-idge,  "  Midsummer-Night's  Dream,"  1716;  Dennis, 
"Coriolanus"  1721;  Charles  Johnson,  "As  You  Like  It,"  1723;  Duke 
of  Buckingham,  "Julius  Ciesar"  into  two  plays,  1722;  Worsdale,  "Tam- 
ing of  the  Siirew,"  1736;  J.  Miller,  "Much  Ado  About  Nothing,"  1737; 
Gibber,  "King  John,"  1744;  Lampe,  "  Midsummer-Night's  Dream"  into 
a  sort  of  operetta,  1745. 

Garriek,  though  abused  by  Laml)  for  falseness  to  Shakspere,  did  much 
in  the  way  of  restoring  the  original  text.  The  story  runs  that  when  Gar- 
rick  was  acting  Macbeth  according  to  tlie  original  text,  Qiiin  asked  him 
where  he  got  all  that  fine  language.  It  is  to  be  remembered  that  Steele 
did  not  quote  the  original  text  in  the  Tatler,  and  we  should  consider  how 


Engl'iah  Literature.  41  y 

II.  A  wholly  new  voice  was  heard  in  Ossian  (1762),  the 
effect  of  which  was,  however,  more  distinctly  marked  on 
the  Continent  than  in  England.*  The  authenticity  of  these 
poems  is  still  a  matter  of  gi-ave  doubt.  At  the  best,  they 
were  versions  of  meagre  relics,  composed  in  the  rhetorical 
language  that  marks  much  of  the  tumid  blank  verse  of 
the  last  century,  with  imitations  of  the  Old  Testament 
and  of  certain  old  Irish  and  Scotch  poems.  Macpherson's 
curious  dependence  on  his  contemporaries,  which  he  ex- 
hibited in  almost  every  line,  probably  endeared  him  to  his 
first  readers.  The  very  vagueness  of  his  descriptions  of 
nature  seemed  like  vivid  accuracy  to  those  who  were  but 
just  beginning  to  enjoy  the  sight  of  scenery  ;  now,  on  the 
other  hand,  it  is  but  an  additional  proof  of  Macpherson's 
forgery.f  But,  such  as  they  were — and  just  what  they 
were  still  remains  uncertain — they  had  a  success  which 
was  incontestable.  They  were  put  into  German,  and  were 
often  reprinted  in  that  country  in  their  English  dress. 
They  were  translated  into  French  and  into  Italian,  and 
were  much  admired  by  Napoleon, J  among  others  ;  and 
versions  appeared  in  Spanish,  Polish,  and  Dutch. 

seldom  we  nowadays,  more  than  one  hundred  years  since  Garrick's  prime, 
see  the  plays  without  great  alteration. 

*  As  Taine  says,  Macpherson  "collected  fragments  of  legends,  plastered 
over  the  whole  an  abundance  of  eloquence  and  rhetoric,  and  created  a  Celtic 
Homer,  Ossian,  who,  with  Oscar,  Malvina,  and  his  whole  troop,  made  the 
tour  of  Europe,  and,  about  1830,  ended  by  furnishing  baptismal  names  for 
French  grisettes  and  perruquiersy — "  English  Lit.,"  ii.  220. 

f  "Poor  moaning,  monotonous  Macpherson,"  as  Carlyle  called  him  in 
his  review  of  Taylor's  "  German  Poetry." — "  Essays,"  ii.  443. 

t  Have  not  his  proclamations,  addresses  to  his  troops,  etc.,  an  Ossianic 
sound?  He  also  liked  "  Werther."  Goethe  said  to  Henry  Crabbe  Rob- 
inson ("Diary,"  ii.  106),  "It  was  the  contrast  w'itli  his  own  nature.  He 
loved  soft  and  melancholy  music.  Werther  was  among  his  books  at  St. 
Helena."     But  is  not  this  statement  too  modest?     Napoleon  liked  "  Wer- 

18* 


4i8  English  Literature. 

In  England  they  from  the  first  met  violent  opposition. 
Dr.  Johnson,  who  detested  them  because  they  were  Scotch, 
as  well  as  because  they  were  animated  by  all  that  he  most 
despised  in  the  new  literature,  was  their  bitterest  opponent. 
His  view  of  them  may  be  gathered  from  the  letter  quoted 
above.  The  Scotch,  however,  rose  like  a  man  in  their  be- 
half. An  ardent  patriotism  sufficed  to  convince  them  that 
Macpherson  was  a  mere  translator  of  their  old  epics,  and 
no  charlatan.  Dr.  Blair,  for  instance,  undertook  to  show 
by  copious  arguments  that  Ossian  was  a  Scotch  Homer, 
and  how,  by  virtue  of  his  genius,  he  had  complied  with 
every  one  of  Aristotle's  laws  : 

"  The  duration  of  the  action  in  Fingal,  is  much  shorter 
than  in  the  Iliad  or  ^neid,  but  sure  there  may  be  shorter 
as  well  as  longer  heroic  poems ;  and  if  the  authority  of 
Aristotle  be  also  required  for  this,  he  says  expressly,  that 
the  epic  composition  is  indefinite  as  to  the  time  of  its 
duration.  Accordingly  the  action  of  the  Iliad  lasts  only 
forty-seven  days,  whilst  that  of  the  iEneid  is  continued 
for  more  than  a  year."  And,  on  the  next  page,  "  Homer's 
art  in  magnifying  the  character  of  Achilles  has  been  uni- 
versally admired.  Ossian  certainly  shows  no  less  art  in  ag- 
grandizing Fingal."  "The  story  which  is  the  foundation 
of  the  Iliad  is  in  itself  as  simple  as  that  of  Fingal,"  etc. 

Yet  Johnson's  opposition  to  the  poems  was  effective  at 
home,  although  it  had  no  influence  abroad,  where  the  read- 
ers expected  roughness  in  a  twofold  translation.  What 
the  influence  of  the  book  was  we  may  see  in  the  second 
pai't  of  Goethe's  "Werther"  (1774),  in  Klopstock,  and  in 
many  of  Goethe's  early  odes  ;  and  Chateaubriand  has  told 

thev  "  because  it  came  out  when  lie  was  young.  Napoleon,  it  must  be  re- 
membered, once  came  near  committing  suicide.  Vide  also  "Eckerraann," 
iii.  28  (.Ian.  2,  1824). 


Englidi  Literature.  419 

us  how  he  was  delighted  by  the  fictitious  bard.  Germany 
especially  was  moved  by  the  Ossianic  spirit.  That  coun- 
try was  then  awakening  to  the  consciousness  of  its  powers, 
and  the  vague,  formless  grandeur  of  Ossian  came  like  a 
sea-breeze  to  expel  the  sultry,  close  air  of  the  artificial 
litei'ature  that  had  pretended  to  exist  for  so  long  a  time. 
The  inspiration,  you  will  notice,  came  to  the  Continent 
from  England.  Lillo,  Richardson,  Sterne,  Goldsmith,  Os- 
sian, each  in  his  own  way  served  as  model  for  French 
and  German  Avriters  ;  Rousseau  was  directly  inspired  by 
Richardson,  and  it  was  from  Rousseau  and  Ossian  that 
Goethe  drew  strength  for  writing  his  "  Werther,"  a  book 
that  swept  over  Europe  like  a  meteor. 

We  of  the  present  day,  one  of  whose  favorite  affecta- 
tions is  the  love  of  sincerity,  are  apt  to  look  with  a  good 
deal  of  contempt  on  the  worship  of  Ossian,  and  to  sneer  at 
our  ancestors  for  finding  any  delight  in  his  tumid  pages. 
It  may  be  questioned,  however,  whether  our  painstaking 
resuscitations  of  the  dead,  with  their  easily  pierced  veneer- 
ing of  local  color,  are  actually  much  better  than  the  vague 
grandeur  and  sham  heroics  of  the  famous  bard.  At  any 
rate,  whether  the  poem  was  really  great  or  really  pretty, 
it  is  our  duty  in  the  first  place  to  understand  why  it  was 
liked,  as  it  undeniably  was,  and  to  do  this  we  must  re- 
member the  growing  intolerance  of  antiquated  and  arti- 
ficial forms.  As  Mr.  Stephen  puts  it  ("  English  Thought," 
ii.  447),  "its  crude  attempts  to  represent  a  social  state 
when  great  men  stalked  through  the  world  in  haughty 
superiority  to  the  narrow  conventions  of  modern  life,  were 
congenial  to  men  growing  weary  of  an  effete  formalism. 
Men  had  been  talking  under  their  breath,  and  in  a  minc- 
ing dialect,  so  long  that  they  were  easily  gratified,  and 
easily  imposed  upon,  by  an  affectation  of  vigorous  and 
natural  sentiment."     Then,  too,  the  science  of  criticism, 


420  English  Literature. 

which  is  really  not  fault-finding,  but  precise  description, 
was  in  its  tenderest  infancy,  and  men  had  few  rules  for 
the  guidance  of  their  belief. 

III.  The  general  interest  in  the  past,  together  with  the 
incompetence  of  the  public  to  determine  what  was  genuine, 
opened  a  tempting  path  before  literary  adventurers,  and 
Chatterton  (1752-VO),  with  his  Rowley  poems  (written  be- 
tween 1V67  and  1770,  and  published  1777),  prepared  a 
controversy  that  was  nearly  as  hot  as  that  over  the  au- 
thenticity of  Ossian.  I  have  not  time  or  space  for  the 
full  discussion  of  Chatterton's  poems  ;  they  may  be  found 
described  at  some  length  and  praised  with  great  fervor 
by  Mr.  Theodore  Watts  in  the  third  volume  of  AVard's 
"English  Poets."  All  that  can  be  said  in  praise  of  Chat- 
terton is  said  there,  as  well  as  some  things  that  cannot  be 
accepted  without  hesitation.  To  assert  that  the  use  of 
proper  names,  like  gems,  for  purposes  of  decoration,  was 
copied  by  Coleridge  in  his  "  Kubla  Khan  "  from  Chatter- 
ton,  who  invented  it,  seems  rash.  We  have  found  the  same 
tendency  in  the  imitators  of  Milton,  in  Thomson,  and  in 
Goldsmith.  It  is  used  with  a  different  purpose  by  the 
various  poets,  because  each  has  his  own  special  message 
to  utter,  and  utters  it  in  his  own  way. 

Then,  too,  Chatterton's  forgeries  form  scarcely  "  a  puz- 
zling chapter  of  literary  history."  It  was,  so  to  speak, 
Chatterton's  only  way  of  being  romantic  ;  he  was  inter- 
ested in  the  past  of  the  Middle  Ages,  and  imitated  it,  as 
hosts  of  poets  have  done  since,  and  the  most  natural  way 
for  him  was  under  an  assumed  personality  ;  this,  too, 
was  his  only  way  of  getting  readers.  If  he  had  sent  out 
his  imitations  as  avowed  imitations,  he  would  have  been 
laughed  at — but  there  was  some  interest  in  old  poems  ; 
they  were  curious  and  interesting  for  the  people  of  that 
polished  age,  who  would  have  derided  taking  them  for 


Englisli  Literature.  421 

models.  The  old  poems  were  at  that  tnne  simply  inter- 
esting curiosities,  which  no  one  thought  of  copying.  Ev- 
ery one  was  eager  to  exhume  relics,  but  with  no  inten- 
tion of  putting  them  to  any  use.  Keats,  it  should  be 
said  in  answer  to  Mr.  Watts,  did  not  so  much  imitate 
Chatterton  as  he  did  those  who  inspired  the  earlier 
poet.* 

At  this  time,  as  we  have  said,  the  taste  of  the  public 
was  very  uncritical.  Dr.  Percy,  when  he  published  his 
famous  "Reliques  of  Ancient  English  Poetry,"  in  1765, 
felt  impelled  to  work  them  over  to  suit  modern  ears,  so 
that  a  new  and  unamended  edition  had  to  be  supplied 
about  fifteen  years  ago,  shorn  of  Percy's  attempted  im- 
provements.f     Scott,  too,  in  his  "Minstrelsy  of  the  Scot- 

*  It  is  curious  to  notice  a  similar  occurrence  in  French  literature.  In 
1803,  a  M.  de  Surville,  who,  by  the  way,  had  fought  among  our  French 
allies  in  the  Revolutionary  war,  published  a  volume  of  poems  alleged  to 
have  been  written  in  the  fifteenth  century  by  an  ancestress  of  his,  Clo- 
tilde  de  Surville.  The  poems  of  this  Gallic  Rowley  he  professed  to  have 
discovered  in  an  old  chest,  but  the  originals  were  said  to  have  been  de- 
stroyed in  the  Revolution.  Criticism  found  itself  between  two  apparent 
impossibilities — one  that  Clotilde  had  written  tlie  poems  in  the  fifteenth 
century,  the  other  that  M.  de  Surville  had  written  them  in  the  eighteenth. 
For  a  long  time,  the  forgery  escaped  detection.  Even  in  Longfellow's 
"  Poets  and  Poetry  of  Europe  "  (184.5),  p.  441,  we  find  them  mentioned  and 
the  best  one  translated,  although  with  a  strong  hint  of  their  ungenuine- 
ness.  In  fact,  this  had  already  been  conclusively  proved  in  France ;  more 
careful  study  of  the  old  language  had  made  the  deception  clear,  in  the 
same  way  that  Rowley  had  been  detected.  The  process  was  more  difficult, 
because  the  execution  was  more  careful  in  the  French  poems.  Vide 
Sainte-Beuve,  "  Tableau  de  la  Poesie  Fran9aise  an  XVP  Siecle,"  p.  475 
et  seq. 

t  Ritson  objected  to  Percy's  inaccuracy,  and  what  was  his  reward  ?  Sir 
E.  E.  Brydges  wrote  of  him  (ciVZe  Alliljone,  &iih  "Ritson"):  "Mr.  Joseph 
Ritson,  unilluminated  by  a  particle  of  taste  or  fancy,  and  remarkable  only 
for  the  unnecessary  drudgery  with  which  he  dedicated  his  life  to  one  of 
the  humblest  departments  of  literary  nntiquities,  and  for  the  bitter  inso- 


422  English,  Literature. 

tish  Border"  (1802-3),  mangled  some  of  the  old  ballads, 
not  from  a  preference  for  bad  work,  but  in  order  to  please 
the  public.  The  readers  of  that  time  wanted  omissions 
supplied,  roughnesses  trimmed  away,  and  everything  pol- 
ished, just  as  now  we  prefer  tinkered  hymns.  Exactness, 
like  all  the  virtues,  is  a  plant  of  slow  growth. 

Percy's  "  Reliques "  is  commonly  mentioned  as  the 
turning-point  in  the  taste  of  the  last  century,  but  it  was 
quite  as  much  the  result,  as  the  cause,  of  the  renewed 
interest  in  old  ballads.  Percy  did  more  completely  what 
had  been  done  feebly  before.  Still,  it  is  well  to  bear  in 
mind  the  date  of  the  publication,  1765,  as  a  mnemonic 
point,  for  this  was  by  far  the  most  important  of  the  col- 
lections.   A  copy  of  the  book  fell  into  the  hands  of  Burger 

lence  of  foul  abuse  with  which  he  communicated  his  dull  acquisitions  to 
the  public." 

Scott  (loc.  cit.)  said:  "A  man  of  acute  observation,  profound  research, 
and  great  labour,  these  valuable  attributes  were  unhappily  combined  with 
an  eager  irritability  of  temper,  which  induced  him  to  treat  antiquarian 
trifles  with  the  same  seriousness  which  men  of  the  world  reserve  for  mat- 
ters of  importance." 

In  1803,  the  same  year  that  Scott's  "Border  Minstrelsy"  was  com- 
pleted, then  appeared  Oehlenschlager's  collection  of  "  Volkslieder;"  these, 
too,  had  been  improved  after  the  usual  fashion. 

Allan  Ramsay  had  offended  in  the  same  way.  He  published,  in  1710, 
"Christ's  Kirk  on  the  Green"  (attributed  to  James  I.  of  Scotland),  and 
afterwards  added  a  first,  and  then  a  second,  canto  of  his  own  composition. 
In  the  "Tea-table  Miscellany"  and  "Evergreen"  "he  abridged,  he  va- 
ried, inodernized,  and  superadded." 

We  need  not  go  so  far  for  instances.  Many  of  the  best-known  hymns 
arc  tinkered,  and  the  process  has  been  going  on  for  many  years.  Vide 
Sir  Roundell  Palmer,  "  The  Book  of  Praise,"  Preface,  and  Ka/ion,  iii. 
65.  The  main  thing  desired  in  a  hymn  is  religious  fervour;  textual  ac- 
curacy is  a  secondary  matter.  In  the  same  way,  Ramsay,  Percy,  and 
Scott  wanted  to  arouse  an  interest  in  the  past,  for  which  precision  was 
pedantry. 


English  Literature.  423 

(1748-94),  who  translated  many  of  the  ballads  into  Ger- 
man, and  was  inspired  by  it  to  write  his  own  "Lenore."* 
This  ballad  ran  through  Europe  with  the  speed  of  its 
knightly  hero,  and  it  was  in  1795  that  a  lady  in  Edinburgh 
showed  it,  in  William  Taylor's  translation,  to  Scott,  who 
imitated  it  in  his  "  William  and  Helen,"  which  he  publish- 
ed along  with  his  "  Wild  Huntsman,"  and  was  soon  fol- 
lowed by  his  version  of  "  Goetz  von  Berlichingen,"  1799. 
It  would  be  fair  to  say  that  Percy's  "  Reliques  "  had  more 
influence  in  Germany  than  in  England.  Burger  and  his 
fellow-poets  of  the  Hainhund,  who  were  all  young  men 
with  a  confused  hatred  of  tyrants  and  great  afl^ection  for 
the  full  moon,  took  to  writing  more  ballads  after  the  old 
pattern,  as  illustrated  by  Percj^'s  "Reliques,"  and  ex- 
plained by  Herder,  and  soon  Herder  established  the  new 
lines  in  which  German  thought  was  destined  to  run,  sub- 
stituting the  intelligent  study  of  the  past  for  the  faithful 
following  of  academic  rules.  Fully  to  describe  Herder's 
work  would  take  us  too  far  from  our  subject.  He  was 
the  guiding- spirit  of  the  new  movement  which  placed 
Germany  in  literature  abreast  of  the  richest  countries  of 
Europe,  and  in  science  ahead  of  any.  And  to  describe 
him  it  would  be  necessary  to  point  out  at  length  the 
enormous  influence  which  Rousseau  had  on  thought  at 
the  end  of  the  last   century.     He  was  one  of  the  men 

*  Written  in  1*773,  and  published  in  1774  in  the  Gottingen  Musenal- 
manach  {vide  Doring :  G.  A.  Biirger,  "  Ein  biog.  Denknial "). 

The  "  Lenore  "  had  been  translated  by  Sir  J.  T.  Stanley,  who  published 
his  translation  in  1786.  It  was  "a  paraphrase,  not  to  say  a  new  poem; 
the  original  being  '  altered  and  added  to,'  to  square  it  with  '  the  cause  of 
religion  and  morality'  "  {vide  Gilchrist's  "Blake,"  i.  138). 

Henry  James  Pye,  poet-laureate  in  1790, also  translated  the  "Lenore," 
as  did  the  Hon.  William  Robert  Spencer,  in  the  same  year,  1796;  this 
last-mentioned  translation  was  illustrated  by  Spencer's  aunt,  Lady  Diana 
Beauclerc. 


424  English  Literature. 

who  did  most  to  depose  reason  and  to  set  up  emotion  in 
its  place,  a  change  which  began  in  England. 

IV.  The  history  of  German  literature  until  nearly  the 
end  of  the  last  century  is  almost  a  reproduction,  in  minia- 
ture to  be  sure,  of  what  we  have  seen  in  England.  We 
have  noticed  certain  points  of  likeness  in  the  intellectual 
growth  of  England,  France,  and  Italy.  Gradually,  as 
modern  thought  spread  into  Germany,  similar  results  fol- 
lowed there.  Thus,  Martin  Opitz  (1597-1639),  a  man  en- 
dowed with  but  little  original  genius,  opened  the  way  for 
a  new  development  of  German  literature  by  announcing 
the  necessity  of  following  the  methods  of  the  classical 
writers,  especially  those  of  Rome.  Yet  he  urged  his  fel- 
low-countrymen to  use  their  own  language  ;  and  in  his 
tastes,  for  he  admired  Seneca  and  Ovid,  as  well  as  in  the 
tendency  of  his  instructions,  he  belongs  to  those  men  who 
announced  the  rules  of  classicism  which  they  barely  un- 
derstood. He  was  intellectually  the  companion  of  Mal- 
herbe  in  France,  and  of  the  early  formal  writers,  between 
Waller  and  Dryden,  in  England.*  To  be  sure,  he  admired 
Ronsard  and  Du  Bellay  among  French  writers,  and  al- 
lowed his  name  to  be  used  on  the  title-page  of  a  trans- 
lation of  Sidney's  "Arcadia  ;"  but  his  own  work  was  cool 
and  restrained. 

What  is  called  the  second  Silesian  school,  of  which 
Ilofmannswaldau  (1618-'79)  and  Lohenstein  (1635-83) 
were  the  leading  representatives,  corresponds  to  the  reign 
of  the  brief-lived  precieux  in  France,  and  that  of  the  so- 
called  metaphysical  poets  in  England.  We  have  seen 
some  of  Cowley's  conceits  ;  Germany  was  not  left  be- 
hind.    Thus,  Ilofmannswaldau  wrote  : 


*  Vide  Hettner,  "  LitL'nitur^^eschichte  das  XVlIl's^"  Jiihiluiudert,"  III.  i. 
180,  and  "  Kobersteiii,"  ii.  46  et  seq. 


English  Literature.  425 

"  Was  ist  doch  insgemein  ein  Freund  in  dieser  Welt  ? 
Eiii  Spiegel,  der  vergrosst  und  fiilschlich  sclioner  maeht, 
Ein  Pfennig,  der  niclit  Sttich  und  niclit  Gewichte  halt, 
Ein  Wesen,  so  aus  Zorn  und  bittrer  Galle  lacliet, 
Ein  Strauclistein,  dessen  Glantz,  uns  Schande  und  Schaden  bringt, 
Ein  Dolcli,  der  scliimniernd  ist,  und  uns  zu  Hcrtzeu  dringt, 
Ein  Heilbrunn,  etc. 
Ein  goldgestickter  Strang,  etc. 
Ein  Honigwurm,  etc. 

Ein  weisses  Henneney,  das  Dracheii  hat  gebohren, 
Ein  falscher  Crocodil,  der  weiner,  i  uns  zerreist, 
Ein  Sirenen-Weib,  ein  Safft,  r  i  Giftbauin,  ein  Apfell  von  Damasc,  ein 

iiberzuckert  Gifft,  eiu  Pff-3ier  in  das  Garn,  ein  goldner  Urtels-Tisch, 

ein  Zeug,"  etc.  1 

There  seems  no  reasoli  for  his  ever  stopping. 

Canitz  (1654-99)  headed  a  reaction  in  favor  of  so- 
berer methods  ;  he  inclined  towards  Opitz  rather  than 
towards  his  lush  '  .  ccessors,  but  he  derived  most  of  his 
inspiration  from  'he  later  Frenchmen,  especially  from  Boi- 
leau.  Johann  von  Besser  (1654-1729)  belonged  to  the 
same  more  modern  school.  He  lived  long  enough  to  be  a 
friend  of  Gottseh  ?d,  who  was  the  most  formidable  foe  of 
anything  like  indifference  to  the  rigid  rules  of  French 
classicism.  It  is  curious  to  notice  how  Canitz,  Besser, 
and  Gottsched  imitated  in  their  play  the  real  work  that 
was  going  on  in  France  and  England.  Biedermann  *  gives 
some  most  amusing  instances  of  the  t  unprofitable  zeal  : 

"  Besser,  on  the  death  of  his  wife,  composed  '  on  the 
day  of  her  funeral'  an  elegy  nine  pages  long,  which, 
however,  even  Gottsched  declared  was  unnatural  and 
void  of  poetic  truth.  To  this  he  added  two  other  poems, 
in  the  name  of  his  children,  one  of  which  was  inscribed 
thus  :  '  This  was  written  to  his  dear  mamma,  on  his  sick 
bed  and  in  his  seventh  year  by  her  most  obedient  and 

*  "  Deutschland  im  XVIII'^^"  Jahrhundert,"  II.  i.  448,  note. 


426  English  Literature. 

only  son.'  The  other,  'A  lament  for  the  untimely  loss 
of  her  dear  mamma  by  her  orphaned  two-year-old  daugh- 
ter.'    The  seven -year- old  boy  is  represented  as  writing 

thus  : 

"Man  sprach,  sie  hatte  luir  ein  Schwesterlein  geboren; 

1st  leider  das  Geburt,  wo  sie  versterbeu  muss  '?' 

[They  said  she  had  brought  forth  a  little  sister  for  me, 
but  is  it  birth,  when  she  must  die  ?  O,  dearest  mamma  ! 
what  has  your  son  lost !  BiK.j\'hat  has  papa  lost  by  this 
sad  blow  !  I  lie  sick,  so  soreve^my  grief,  and  she  who 
should  console  me  is  the  preyHi*'^  death,'  etc.]  More- 
over, Besser  asked  his  friends  ^.'^i*  additional  eulogies, 
and  so  appeared  a  stately  'memorial  for  the  late  Mrs. 
Besser,  nee  Kiihlewein,'  He  also  composed  an  elegy  on 
the  death  of  the  wife  of  Canitz.  At  the  very  beginning 
he  wanted  to  express  the  thought  that  she  had  never 
grieved  her  husband  except  by  dying,  but  he  could  not 
put  it  in  such  a  way  as  would  satisfy  him,  try  as  he  would  ; 
hence  he  communicated  his  perplexity  to  the  disconsolate 
widower.  Canitz  set  to  work  at  once,  in  friendly  rivalry, 
and  wrote  some  lines  that  seemed  to  him  very  fair,  but 
he  suppressed  them  because  at  last  Besser  was  able  to 
write  something  which  seemed  better. 

"  In  Weichraann's  '  Poesie  der  Niedersachsen,'  vol.  ii. 
p.  249,  are  printed  l\)iir  elegies  on  the  death  of  a  son  of 
the  poet  Brockes,  and  the  heart-broken  father  replies  in 
verse,  using  the  same  rhymes.  Mosheim,  who  was  an  ab- 
bot, on  the  death  of  his  wife  wrote  to  Gottsched  that,  hav- 
ing lost  so  worthy  and  amiable  a  spouse,  he  felt  it  to  be  his 
duty  to  give  the  world  a  testimonial  of  his  deep  grief  ;  but, 
as  he  was  no  poet,  would  not  Gottsched  write  an  elegy  in 
his  name  ;  and  to  make  it  easier  he  sent  him  a  description 
of  the  departed  lady.  Gottsched  at  once  composed  an 
elegy,   for  which   Mosheim   sent   a   modest  honorarium. 


English  Literature.  '  427 

The  widower  expressed  bis  satisfaction  with  the  poem, 
but,  he  said,  '  I  shall  have  to  add  a  few  lines,  for,  as  a 
teacher  of  spiritual  truth,  I  must  really  say  something 
about  patience  and  trust  in  God.' " 

For  instances  of  incredible  provincialism  the  reader 
must  consult  the  various  German  authorities  referred  to 
by  Biedermann.  If,  however,  the  faults  of  pseudo-classi- 
cism were  magnified  in  Germany,  the  awakening,  when  it 
came,  was  such  as  not  even  the  most  hopeful  could  have 
dared  to  expect.  It  is  to  be  remembered,  too,  that  the  in- 
spiration reached  Germany  from  the  outside.  Such  medi- 
ocrity, and  worse  than  mediocrity,  as  we  have  seen,  was 
powerless  even  to  beget  a  healthy  reaction.  It  was  mainly 
from  England  that  the  great  change  came,  and  with  one 
bound  Germany  sprang  into  line  with  the  oldest  civiliza- 
tions of  Europe.  It  is  no  wonder  that  Germans  are  fond  of 
studying  the  history  of  their  own  literature.  Few  coun- 
tries have  had  so  dramatic  an  experience.  Although  the 
ballads  w^ere  an  important  indication  of  the  new  literary 
fervor  in  Germany,  they  were  not  the  only  one.  In  1774 
Goethe's  "Werther"  had  appeared,  and  it  was  not  long 
before  the  novel  became  known  in  England.  Scott  says 
in  the  pi-eface  to  his  translation  of  "  Goetz  von  Ber- 
lichingen,"  that  "  it  is  by  the  elegant  author  of  the  Sor- 
rows of  Werther,"  of  which  a  translation  had  appeared  in  i  \ 
1779,  followed  by  another  in  1786.*  The  prejudice  against  ' 
the  alleged  immorality  and  atheism  of  the  Germans  was 
very  great ;  the  language  was  not  commonly  known — it 
held  very  much  the  same  position  that  the  Russian  does 

*  There  were  three  French  translations  before  the  Revolution — the  first, 
from  which  the  first  English  one  was  taken,  in  1775.  After  the  Revolution 
the  book  became  better  known,  and  nine  new  translations  appeared  be- 
tween 1792  and  1809  {vide  J.  W.  Appell,  "  Werther  und  seine  Zeit," 
and  "  Goethe-Jahrbuch,"  iii.  27). 


428  English  Littrature. 

now  ;  it  had  not  become  an  essential  part  of  every  edu- 
cated person's  education.  The  sentimentality  of  the  Ger- 
mans was  much  derided  by  the  Tories.  They  were  looked 
upon  as  destructive  and  dangerous  radicals,  philosophical 
socialists,  and  free-lovers.  Coleridge,  for  instance,  was 
much  attacked  for  his  praise  of  this  people,  and  even 
Lamb  was  lugged  in  for  reproof,  although  it  was  simply 
as  a"  friend  of  Coleridge  that  he  was  held  up  to  general 
execration.  lie  himself  knew  very  little  about  German 
literature,  and  was  frequently  ridiculing  Coleridge's  admi- 
ration of  it.  He  speaks  of  "  Faust,"  in  a  letter  to  him,  as 
follows,  Aug.  26,  1814  :  "I  have  been  reading  Madame 
Stael  on  Germany  ;  an  impudent,  clever  woman.  But  if 
'  Faust '  be  no  better  than  her  abstract  of  it,  I  counsel  thee 
to  let  it  alone.  How  canst  thou  translate  the  language  of 
cat-monkeys?*  Fie  on  such  fantasies  !"  ("Works,"  i.  160). 
And,  earlier,  Aug.  6,  1800,  he  tells  Coleridge  that  he  has 
sent  him,  "  with  one  or  two  small  German  books,"  "  that 
drama  in  which  got-fader  performs"  (i.  115).  Again  (ii. 
114),  in  a  letter  to  Patmore  asking  about  his  dog  Dash,  he 
says  :  "  What  I  scratch  out  is  a  German  quotation  from 
Lessing,  on  the  bite  of  rabid  animals  ;  but  I  remember 

you  don't  read  German.     But  Mrs.  P rnay,  so  I  wish 

I  had  let  it  stay.  The  meaning  in  English  is — 'Avoid 
to  approach  an  animal  suspected  of  madness,  as  you  would 
avoid  fire  or  a  precipice,'  which  I  think  is  a  sensible  ob- 
servation. The  Germans  are  certainly  profounder  than 
we."     This  is  certainly  not  the  language  of  an  adorer  of 

*  Lrtiiil)  refers  to  lior  "  De  rAlleniapjne,"  pt.  ii.  oli.  xxiii. :  "  On  emit 
decouvrer,  on  ecoiitant  ie  langage  eoniirjiic  <le  ccs  chats-singes,  quelles 
seroient  les  idees  des  aniinaux  s'iis  pomoient  les  expriir.er,  quelle  image 
grossiere  et  ridicule  ils  so  feroieut  de  la  nature  et  de  I'lionime." 

Tlie  scene  in  the  "  Hexeukiiche  "  is  meant,  in  which  appear  Kater  and 
Katzin. 


English  Literature.  429 

German  literature.*  Another  important  influence  at  work 
to  restrain  the  English  from  excessive  enthusiasm  for 
foreign  literature  was  the  general  horror  of  the  French 
principles,  which  greatly  strengthened  the  English  con- 
servatism at  the  time  of  the  French  Revolution  and  later. 
Moreover,  the  very  movement  towards  the  study  of  their 
old  literature  coniirmed  the  patriotism  of  most  of  the  na- 
tions of  Europe,  and  encouraged  them  against  the  en- 
forced cosmopolitanism  which  Napoleon's  armies  were 
carrying  everywhere.  What  was  thought  of  the  German 
radicalism,  and  of  the  plays  and  stories  of  that  people  in 
the  last  ten  years  of  the  eighteenth  century,  may  be  seen 
in  many  quarters  ;  among  others,  in  the  very  amusing 
Anti-Jacobin  Iieview,\  to  which  Canning  and  John  Hook- 

*  Henry  Crabbe  Robinson  ("Diary,"  ii.  109) :  "Charles  Lamb,  though 
he  always  affected  contempt  for  Goethe,  yet  was  manifestly  pleased  that 
his  name  was  known  to  him."  Goethe  thought  that  Lamb  had  writ- 
ten  a  sonnet  on  his  own  name.  Lamb  even  wrote  a  "  ballad  from  the  Ger- 
man "  ("  Works,"  iv.  32) : 

"  The  clouds  are  blackening,  the  storm  is  threatening." 

\  Place  aux  dames.  The  excellent  Hannah  More  wrote  (as  qiioted 
in  Carlyle's  "Essays,"  ii.  416):  "Those  ladies  who  take  the  lead  in 
society  are  loudly  called  upon  to  act  as  guardians  of  the  public  taste  as 
well  as  of  the  public  virtue.  They  are  called  upon,  therefore,  to  oppose 
■with  the  whole  weight  of  their  influence,  the  irruption  of  those  swarms  of 
Publications  now  daily  issuing  from  the  banks  of  the  Danube,  which,  like 
their  ravaging  predecessors  of  the  darker  ages,  though  with  far  other  and 
more  fatal  arms,  are  overrunning  civilized  society.  Those  readers  whose 
purer  taste  has  been  formed  on  the  correct  models  of  the  old  classic  school, 
see  with  indignation  and  astonishment  the  Huns  and  Vandals  once  more 
overpowering  the  Greeks  and  Romans.  They  behold  our  minds,  with  a 
retrograde  but  rapid  motion,  hurried  back  to  the  reign  of  Chaos  and  old 
Night,  by  distorted  and  unprincipled  compositions,  which,  in  spite  of  strong 
flashes  of  genius,  unite  the  taste  of  the  Goths  with  the  morals  of  Bagshot." 
"  The  newspapers  announce  that  Schiller's  tragedy  of  the  '  Robbers,'  which 


430  English  Literature. 

ham  Frere  were  prominent  contributors.  Coleridge  and 
Southey  are  there  spoken  of  in  a  way  that  makes  one 
doubt  whether  poets  are  really  as  sensitive  as  they  are 
sometimes  said  to  be.  The  play  called  "The  Rivals,  or 
the  Double  Arrangement "  (1 V98),  is  a  most  unjust  although 
amusing  parody  of  the  German  plays  of  the  time,  Goethe, 
Schiller,  and  Kotzebue  being  impartially  derided.  It  was 
really  not  until  time  had  shown  the  Heedlessness  of  the 
panic  about  Germany  that  the  literature  of  that  coimtry 
again  received  anything  like  the  attention  it  deserved.  It 
was  Carlyle  who,  more  than  any  other  one  man,  in  his  re- 
view articles  now  published  in  his  Essays,  directed  the 
attention  of  the  English  people  to  what  they  had  long 
neglected.  These  reviews  appeared  about  1830,  contem- 
poraneous with  the  similar  work  of  Stapfer  and  Ampere 
in  France,  and  since  then  German  has  been  studied  with 
ever-increasing  vigor. 

V.  I  have  said  that  the  excitement  over  the  French 
Revolution  had  the  effect  of  strengthening  the  national 
consciousness  of  the  different  countries  of  Europe,  and  the 
new  literature  aided  this.  Instead  of  a  cosmopolitan  lit- 
erature which  should  spread  over  Europe  like  the  fashion 
of  wearing  wigs,  the  discovery  of  the  old  ballads,  of  the 
early  ante-classical  plays  and  poems,  brought  before  the 

inflamed  the  young  nobility  of  Germany  to  enlist  themselves  into  a  band  of 
highwaymen  to  rob  in  the  forests  of  Bohemia,  is  now  acting  in  England  by 
persons  of  quality." — "  Strictures  on  the  Modern  System  of  Female  Edu- 
cation," 1799. 

The  ihiti-Jacohin  was  equally  timorous,  though  with  less  excuse.  Han- 
nah More  detested  the  Anti-Jacobin  ;  vide  letter  in  "  Life,"  p.  169,  in  which 
she  says,  Sept.  11,  1800,  "  It  is  spreading  more  mischief  over  the  land  than 
almost  any  other  book,  because  it  is  doing  it  under  the  mask  of  loyalty." 

These  views  may  be  compared  with  the  less  timorous  but  equally  in- 
exact remarks  of  La  Harpe  in  his  notice  of  "  Werther." 


English  Literature.  431 

public  very  strongly  the  notion  of  national  models  and 
forgotten  enthusiasms.* 

The  first  effect,  as  well  as  the  most  lasting  oncj^of  the._ 
jreturn  to  the  past  was  a  most  inspiring  one.  Its  most 
noteworthy  representative  was  Burns.  What  a  change 
we  have  here  !  And  yet  it  is  to  be  remembered  that  for 
a  long  time  there  had  been  fermenting  the  principles — so 
far  as  principles  ferment — that  influenced  him.  Through- 
out the  eighteenth  century  there  had  been  numberless 
song-writers  in  Scotland  ;  as  Mr.  Minto  says,  in  his  notice 
of  the  Scotch  minor  song-writers  (Ward,"  English  Poets," 
iii.  486),  "Peers,  members  of  the  Supreme  Court  of  Law, 
diplomatists,  lairds,  clergymen,  schoolmasters,  men  of  sci- 
ence, farmers,  gardeners,  compositors,  pedlers  —  all  were 
trying  their  hands  at  patching  old  songs  and  making  ney^ 
songs."  Allan  Ramsay  had  made  his  collections,  but  Mr. 
Minto  is  right  in  saying  that  very  little  of  real  worth  was 
produced  by  the  writers  of  that  school.  The  sources  were 
poisoned  by  continual  awe  of  the  better-known  literature 
of  England,  then  in  a  most  flourishing  condition  ;  but,  as 
this  grew  pompous  and  empty,  the  truer  inspiration  proved 
more  powerful,  and  a  large  number  of  excellent  Scotch 
songs  were  written  in  the  last  century,  before  the  time  of 
Burns.  He  was  the  final  product  of  a  long-continued  ten- 
dency in  one  direction,  and  not  a  miraculous  phenomenon. 
He  had  his  roots  deep  in  the  past.  There  had  been  many 
versifiers  mastering  different  measures,  which  reached 
Burns  in  a  state  of  completeness ;  these  men  made  a  small 
but  eager  public  familiar  with  countless  references  and 

*  One  instance  of  the  growth  of  national  feeling  at  this  time  is  the  re- 
vival, in  an  artificial  form,  of  the  Highland  dress.  A  somewhat  similar 
perversion  of  patriotism  that  we  see  in  German}'  is  the  fervent  respect 
which  some  writers  show  for  the  mediaeval  text.  The  Roman  letters  are 
regarded  by  them  as  effeminate  foreign  luxuries. 


432  English  Literature. 

illusions  ;  they  introduced  a  number  of  subjects,  which 
he,  with  his  genius,  Avas  able  to  treat  with  greater 
beauty,  giving  them  the  final  touch  that  makes  poetry 
immortal. 

We  have  Burns's  own  testimony  that  he  busily  studied 
the  old  ballads*  and  songs  of  Scotland,  which  had  never 
died  out  of  the  familiar  knowledge  of  the  people.  If  he 
had  not  told  us  this,  it  might  have  been  readily  con- 
jectured by  observation  of  the  metres  of  his  poems,  when 
he  spoke,  or,  rather,  sang  Avords  that  tended  to  sweep 
away  all  the  chill,  didactic  moralizing  that  had  so  long 
made  up  the  body  of  English  verse. 

"  Through  busiest  street  and  loneliest  glen 
Are  felt  the  flashes  of  his  pen ; 
He  rules  'mid  winter  snows,  and  when 

Bees  fill  their  hives ; 
Deep  in  the  general  heart  of  men 

His  power  survives." 

Thus  Wordsworth  wrote  in  one  of  Burns's  favorite  meas- 
ures, one,  it  may  be  said,  that  he  found  in  common  use 
among  Scotch  song-writers.f      At  another  time  Words- 


*  "In  my  infant  and  boyish  days  I  owed  much  to  an  old  woman  who 
resided  in  the  family,  remarkable  for  her  ignorance,  credulity,  and  super- 
stition. She  had,  I  suppose,  the  largest  collection  in  the  country  of  tales 
and  songs  concerning  devils,  ghosts,  fairies,  brownies,  witches,  warlocks," 
etc.  "The  earliest  composition  that  I  recollect  taking  pleasure  in  was 
the  '  Vision  of  Mirza,'  Addison's  hymn,  '  How  are  thy  servants  blest,  0 
Lord,'  in  Mason's  '  Select  Collection  of  English  Songs.'  "  This  may  have 
been  the  book  he  refers  to  as  "  my  vadc  mecumr  "  I  pored  over  them 
driving  my  cart,  or  walking  to  labour,  song  by  song,  verse  by  verse ;  careful- 
ly noting  the  true,  tender,  or  sublime  from  affectation  and  fustian  "  (letter 
to  Dr.  Moore,  Aug.  2, 1787). 

f  V'uh  Watson's  Collection,  pt.  i.  p.  3'2,  "The  Life  and  Death  of  the 
I'iper  of  Kilbarchan  ;"  and  "  William  Lithgow,  Writer  in  Edinburgh,  His 
Epit:iph,"  pt.  ii.  p.  67  : 


Engliish  Literahwe.  433 

worth,  who  was  by  no  means  lavish  with  praise  of  other 
poets,  wrote  of  Burns  : 

"  Whose  light  I  hailed  when  first  it  shone, 
And  showed  my  youth, 
How  verse  may  build  a  princely  throne 
On  humble  truth." 

The  formal  literature  of  Scotland  before  Burns  was 
peculiarly  stilted  ;  but  the  poet  turned  his  back  on  that 
exaggerated  artiticiality,  and  went  back  to  the  people, 
whose  influence  began  to  be  felt  in  literature  and  in  pol- 
itics as  never  before.  Now  was  the  time  that  we  find 
fully  stated  one  of  the  truths  which  it  had  been  long 
learning  from  many  teachers — namely,  that  man  qua  man 
is  an  object  of  interest  and  sympathy.  In  other  words, 
what  is  a  platitude  in  literature  and  conversation,  and 
still  a  surprise  to  us  when  we  became  awai-e  of  it  in  life — 
the  notion,  that  is,  that  all  men  are  brothers — was  by  him 
plainly  asserted  ;  asserted,  we  must  remember,  not  discov- 
ered ;  the  century  had  done  that.  The  great  democratic 
truth  to  which  we  all  bow  with  great  civility,  but  seldom 
take  home  with  us,  so  that  possibly  it  may  some  day 
enter  the  house  without  invitation,  was  reached  with 
great  difficulty.  We  have  seen  its  slow  attainment. in 
the  history  of  fading  literary  tenets  and  of  revolutionary 
conceptions  of  literary  propriety,  just  as,  possibly,  the  im- 
pending struggle  in  Europe  between  authority  and  free- 
dom is  foreshadowed  in  certain  forms  of  more  recent 
literature,  as  in  realism,  for  instance. 

"His  wife  was  also  (as  all  are)  Bad. 
She  sold  away  all  that  he  had, 
Which  broke  his  heart  and  made  it  sad 

And  cold  as  lead  ; 
Yet  he  was  ay  an  honest  Lad 
But  now  he's  Dead." 
19 


434 


l'j)(llish  I.iti'raturr 


Tills  uolioii  i>r  \vli:il  is  calliMl  the  hrol  licrlitxxl  of  iii:in  ;i 
])lir;is('  (li;it  is  olVciisivt'  to  our  cars  lioiu  ils  hciiiji,'  so  iiiiicli 
luoiitlu'd  l)v  tli'iiia!j,()<;ii('S — is  mil  iicccssarily  :it  variance 
\\\\\\  wlial  \vc  uoliccd  of  (lie  <;ro\\lli  of  iialioiial  Iccliuij;; 
for  lliat  is  l»ii(  one  step  (owai'ds  (lie  coiii|>rclicnsioii  of  tlic 
hiuluM"  truth.  W'lial  foruuMl  llic  coimiion  basis  of  hotli 
luovciiiciits,  or,  rallicr,  made  lliciii  piacl  ically  one  lliiiii;', 
was,  first,  (lie  |tcrcc|tl  i(ui  of  an  idcii(i(y  oi  iiUcri'sts,  and 
so  of  eiModons,  and  (lien,  as  a  ma((cr  of  course,  syni|»a(  liy 
(|uicklv  lollowcd.  l(  would  lie  uii\visc>  (o  j^ivc  all  (lie 
credit  of  this  to  literature,  for  literal  ure,  while  i(  (caches, 
is  l)ii(  (he  ex])ression  of  o|)ini<tns  alrea<ly  rorincd.  l)oiil»(- 
Icss,  wi<lcnin!4'  <'oinincrcc  did  much  (owards  o|>cniii;.>;  (he 
way  for  a  chan!i,'c,  luil  rUcralurc  aided  (he  i;rcal  movc- 
ineiil.  The  iniinitclv  rcas(Uial>le  liciiiLi;  who,  lor  iiislancc, 
tired  his  iinaL;'iiia(  ion  with  AUcnsidc's  dcscri|>lion  of  ils 
phasiircs,  was  far  icinovt-d  i'rom  wide  intert-sts  or  Ironi 
L;'ciieral  syin|»alliy  with  niankiml.  'That  was  urowin^'  up 
in  out -of  I  lic-wa  V  corners,  iiol  in  Ihc^rcat  hiL;li\\a\  which 
was  ad(uned  with  the  stuccoed  inonumenis  that  are  now 
crumldinn".  In  those  (he  Kcason  was  worshipped;  Ihc 
adfU'alion  ol  Ihc  eiiiolioiis  had  a  touch  of  hcrcs\  alioiil 
it.  Ivcasou  was  the  stale  church  ;  only  dissenters  uor 
shippctl  the  einol  ions.'*' 

We  ha\('  already  seen  numerous  inslanccs  (d'  I  his  ex- 
tension of  svmpatliy,  and  other  e\  idciicc  is  rcailil\  (o  he 
had,  and  iiolahly  in  'IMioinson.  'I'liiis,  in  his  "Summci" 
(1.  <m;|  e(  sc(|.)  : 


*  It  would  1)0  oxtrcnicly  intcroHtiiif?,  if  HpiU'o  pcMMiiittcd,  to  iiuini  mil  liovv 
Mclliodisni,  wliicli  iirosc  simiilliuicously  with  llii'  f^rciii  roiiiiuilic  niovc- 
iiiriit — /.  /'.,  (lie  I'i'viviil  nC  t'liiiilional  (Vciiiii^ — wiiH  tin-  rcii^fiuiis  cxiircsHioii 
ol'  tli(^  siuiic  <;rli<'i'al  iiiu\  ciiiclll.  Ilitllilli.Mlil  would  lliili  lie  riioIIk  r  drvcl- 
o|iincnt  of  roiiiaiilicisiii. 


English  Literature.  435 

"  Breather!  hot 
From  all  the  boundless  furnace  of  the  sky 
And  the  wide  glittering  waste  of  burning  sand, 
A  suffocating  Wind  the  pilgrim  smites 
With  instant  death.     Patient  of  thirst  and  toil, 
Son  of  the  desert,  e'en  the  camel  feels. 
Shot  through  his  withered  heart,  the  fiery  blast. 
Or  from  the  black-red  ether,  bursting  broad. 
Sallies  the  sudden  Whirlwind.     Straight  the  sands, 
Commoved  around,  in  gathering  eddies  play; 
Nearer  and  nearer  still  they  darkening  come ; 
Till,  with  the  general  all-involving  storm 
Swept  up,  the  whole  continuous  Wilds  arise; 
And  by  their  noon-day  fount  dejected  thrown, 
Or  sunk  at  night  in  sad  disastrous  sleep. 
Beneath  descending  hills,  the  Caravan 
Is  buried  deep.     In  Cairo's  crowded  streets 
The  iinpajtient  merchant,  wondering,  waits  in  vain. 
And  Mecca  saddens  at  the  long  delay." 

This  passage  shows  us  how  commerce  was  widening 
the  interests  of  the  English  ;  and  the  interest  in  the  poor 
is  indicated  by  tliese  lines  ("  Winter,"  1.  322  et  scq.)  : 

"  Ah  !  little  think  the  gay  licentious  Proud, 
Whom  pleasure,  power,  and  affluence  surround  ; 
They  wh6  their  thoughtless  hours  in  giddy  mirth. 
And  wanton,  often  cruel,  riot  waste  ; 
Ah !  little  think  they,  while  they  dance  along, 
How  many  feel,  this  very  moment,  Death, 
And  all  the  sad  variety  of  pain. 

***** 

"  How  many  bleed, 
By  shameful  variance  betwixt  man  and  man. 
How  many  pine  in  Want,  and  dungeon-glooms; 
Shut  from  the  common  air  and  common  use 
Of  their  own  limbs.     How  many  drink  the  cup 
Of  baleful  grief,  or  eat  the  bitter  broad 
Of  Misery.     Sore  pierced  by  wintry  winds. 


43^  English  Literature. 

How  many  shrink  into  the  sordid  hut 
Of  cheerless  poverty. 

***** 
And  how  can  I  forget  the  generous  band, 
Who,  touched  with  human  woe,  redressive  searched 
Into  the  horrors  of  the  gloomy  jail — 
Unpitied  and  unheard,  when  Misery  moans  ; 
"When  Sickness  pines ;  when  Thirst  and  Hunger  burns. 
And  poor  Misfortune  feels  the  lash  of  Vice  ?" 

In  the  same  book  lie  describes  the  shepherd  dying  in  the 
snow  ;  the  descent  of  the  wolves, 

"By  wintry  famine  roused,  from  all  the  tract 
Of  horrid  mountains  which  the  shining  Alps, 
And  wavy  Apennines  and  Pyrenees, 
Branch  out  stupendous  into  distant  lands ;" 

the  Grisons,  overwhelmed  with  avalanches  (1.  414,  etc.); 
and  (1.  800,  etc.)  the  Russian  exile.  Although  the  descrip- 
tions are  too  often  academic  and  marked  by  the  false 
Areadianism  of  the  time,  they  were  all  new  appearances 
in  English  literature,  and  what  Thomson  stated  with  a 
good  deal  ol-  rhetorical  flourish  was  also  uttered  in  their 
own  way  by  other  poets.  Shenstone's  "  Schoolmistress^" 
which  Shenstonc  tried  to  save  from  criticism  by  pretend- 
ing that  he  meant  the  poem  for  a  caricature.  Goldsmith's 
"Deserted  Village,"  and  Gray's  "Elegy"  deal  with  the 
condition  of  the  poor.  And  the  ballads  which  began  to 
be  written  at  about  the  same  time  naturally  took  hold 
of  new  and  simpler  subjects,  which  were  simply  treated. 

It  may  be  justly  urged  that  some  of  these  poets  were 
more  concerned  for  the  picturesqueness  of  what  they  de- 
scribed than  animated  by  any  great  zeal  for  the  welfare  of 
their  kind,  but  that  does  not  affect  their  claims  to  be  the 
first  discoverers  of  this  new  and  fertile  region;  and,  more- 
over, it  is  only  a  proof  that  they  were  better  writers  than 


English  Literature.  437 

philanthropists  ;  and  the  world  requires,  before  all  things, 
of  poets  that  they  should  be  able  to  put  well  whatever 
they  may  have  to  say.  Nothing  is  ever  put  as  well  as 
it  can  be  until  it  is  expressed  by  some  one  who  is  mas- 
tered by  an  overwhelming  need  to  utter  that  above  all 
things  in  the  world.  Such  a  person  is  more  likely  to 
take  the  current  forms  of  his  day,  and  say  his  say  in  them. 
New  models  are  often  chosen  by  men  whose  first  desire 
is  for  novelty. 

If  Thomson  was  cold,  and  possibly  indifferent,  the  ac- 
cusation cannot  be  brought  against  Cowper,  the  English 
fellow-worker  with  Burns.  He,  to  be  sure,  did  not  spring 
from  the  soil  like  the  Scotch  singer  ;  he  was  rather  the 
product  of  a  combination  of  literary  culture  and  delicate 
susceptibility  to  nature  and  simplicity.  One  main  differ- 
ence between  him  and  his  contemporaries,  to  which  Hett- 
ner  calls  attention,  is  this — that,  while  they  copied  other 
poets,  he  copied  nature.  They  drew  their  inspiration 
from  Milton,  or  Spenser,  or  Pope  ;  he  drew  his  from 
the  simple  life  he  led  and  the  things  he  saw  about  him. 
He  was  the  first  of  the  modern  English  poets  to  describe 
nature  directly,  as  he  saw  it,  instead  of  doing  it  by  cull- 
ing adjectives  and  phrases  from  others'  books. 

I  will  not  quote  corroboratory  passages  ;  waning  space 
forbids  this  ;  but  I  will  refer  the  reader  to  the  descrip- 
tions in  the  "Winter  Morning  Walk,"  the  "Garden,"  the 
"  Winter  Evening,"  and  the  "  Timepiece,"  for  examples. 
Cowper's  poetry  will  not  win  hosts  of  admirers  ;  no  so- 
cieties will  be  formed  for  the  purpose  of  reading  papers 
on  his  verses  and  expounding  his  meaning  ;  but  the  reader 
who  may  be  interested  in  other  things  than  the  pomp 
and  clatter  of  contemporary  poetry  will  be  rewarded  by 
occasional  tender,  simple  passages.  He  will  detect  many 
attractive  qualities  in  the  poems,  but  he  is  tolerably  sure 


438  English  Literature. 

not  to  be  swept  off  his  feet  by  enthusiasm.  This  is  gen- 
erally the  fate  of  a  reformer,  of  the  first  man  who  writes 
under  a  new  impulse.  He  is  like  the  guide-post  where 
roads  divide  ;  he  points  the  way  which  others  are  able  to 
make  more  attractive,  and  is  soon  forgotten.  We  overlook 
Cowper's  simple  record  of  nature  while  we  are  under  the 
influence  of  Wordsworth's  mightier  verse,  and  we  grow 
impatient  of  his  philosophy  when  we  see  how  much  fur- 
ther later  poets  carried  the  notion  of  the  brotherhood  of 
man  which  he  was  one  of  the  first  authoritatively  to 
utter. 

Cowper's  poems  appeared  in  1782  and  1783.  Ten  years 
later  Wordsworth  gave  the  world  his  "  Evening  Walk  " 
and  "  Descriptive  Sketches,"  in  which  we  find  much  more 
distinctly  the  traces  of  the  eighteenth  century  than  any 
indications  of  what  was  to  make  the  nineteenth  memor- 
able. Wordsworth  had  not  yet  caught  up  with  his  own 
time.  He  was  still  in  leading-strings,*  and  these  poems 
abound  with  reminiscences  of  Goldsmith's  sonorous  lines. 
Even  such  men  as  Michael  Bruce  (1746-07)  and  John 
Logan  (1748-88),  though  evidently  the  product  of  their 
own  day,  had  their  faces  more  directly  turned  towards 
the  day  that  was  dawning.  Wordsworth  was  doubtless 
rendered  harsh  in  his  judgment  of  the  eighteenth  century 
by  the  recollection  of  some  of  the  unprofitable  enthusi- 
asms of  his  youth,  which  ins])ired  such  lines  as  these, 
which  echo  Goldsmith  and  Thomson  : 

"  To  hear  the  roar 
That  stuns  the  tremulous  cliils  of  high  Lodore;" 
and  these  : 

"  Fair  scenes,  erewhile,  I  taught,  a  happy  child. 
The  echo  of  your  rocks  my  carol  wild ; 

*  Vide  Mr.  J.  R.  Lowell's  article  on  Wordsworth  iu  "Among  my  Books," 
2d  series. 


English  Literature.  Ali9 

Tlion  did  no  ebb  of  cheerfulness  demand 

Sad  tides  of  joy  from  inelancholv's  hand. 

In  youth's  wild  eye  the  livelong  day  was  bright, 

The  sun  at  morning,  and  the  stars  at  night, 

Alike  when  first  the  vales  the  bittern  lilis, 

Or  the  first  woodcocks  roamed  the  hills. 

In  thoughtless  gaiety  I  coursed  the  plain. 

And  hope  itself  was  all  I  knew  of  pain ; 

For  then,  e'en  then  the  little  heart  would  beat 

At  times  while  young  Content  forsook  her  seat, 

And  wild  Impatience,  pouiting  upward,  showed, 

Where,  tipped  with  gold,  the  mountain  summits  glowed." 

In  sucli  lines  as  these  we  are  back  in  the  calm  of  the 
eighteenth  century  : 

"  Even  here  Content  has  fixed  her  smiling  reign 
With  Independence,  child  of  high  Disdain." 

"  Plunge  with  the  Russ  embrown'd  by  Terror's  breath." 

"  Bare  steeps,  where  Desolation  stalks,  afraiil." 

Yet  before  the  century  had  reached  its  end  by  the  al- 
manac, he  was  speaking  with  his  own  voice,  for  the  "  Lyri- 
cal Ballads"  were  published  in  1798.  The  discussion  of 
that  book,  however,  falls  outside  of  our  present  limits. 
In  them  there  spoke  the  spirit  of  a  new  age,  which  the 
greater  part  of  the  previous  hundred  years  had  been  pre- 
paring ;  for  the  centuries,  like  the  magazines,  always  ap- 
pear in  advance  of  their  date. 

VI.  It  is  sometimes  urged  against  this  way  of  regard- 
ing literature,  that  it  tends  to  lower  our  admiration  of 
genius  by  showing  that  this  lacks  what  we  may  call  its 
dajmonic  quality,  and  is  itself  subject  to  the  control  of 
law.  It  is  demanded  of  us  that  we  regard  genius  as  some- 
thing absolutely  inexplicable,  as  a  miraculous  quality  that 
occasionally  flashes  over  the  amazed  world  as  a  comet 
does  over  the  midnight  sky,  more  brilliant  than  the  mo- 


440  English  Literature. 

iiotonous  stars  and  apparently  following  its  own  free  will. 
Yet,  while  the  genesis  of  comets  is  obscure,  their  paths 
are  all  marked  out  beforehand  ;  and  from  them  they  can- 
not swerve  save  in  obedience  to  law.  Genius  is  no  less 
wonderful  for  being  modified  by  circumstances ;  only 
when  these  are  favorable  does  it  attain  its  highest  de- 
velopment. A  man  must  have  hearers  before  he  will  say 
his  best.  When  we  are  talking  to  ourselves  we  speak  be- 
low our  breath  ;  only  when  we  are  addressing  some  one 
else  do  we  use  our  full  voice.  The  man  who  is  sure  of 
an  audience  derives  from  that  feeling  the  delight  that  a 
speaker  knows  when  he  stands  before  an  eager  multitude. 
Without  that  he  is  dumb.  Doubtless  the  orations  that 
Demosthenes  uttered  on  the  sea-shore  were  inferior  to 
those  with  which  he  fired  the  Athenians  against  Philip. 
The  man  who  bows  to  his  time  may  waste  his  strength  in 
uncongenial  and  inferior  work,  as  did  Addison  when  he 
ceased  to  be  natural  and  wrote  his  "  Cato."  The  writer 
who  defies  his  time  is  fortunate  if  he  is  merely  eccentric  : 
it  cannot  be  simply  a  coincidence  that  Collins  and  Blake, 
the  most  rarely  poetical  minds  of  the  last  century,  Avere 
mad.  Gray  gave  up  trying  to  reach  deaf  ears,  and  con- 
soled himself  with  study. 

Yet  the  opposition  to  regarding  the  laws  by  which  genius 
is  limited  lies  deep.  We  cannot  bear  to  think  that  the  in- 
tellect is  subject  to  law,  like  the  dull  stone.  We  cannot 
endure  the  thought  that  while  our  bodies  are  limited  in 
power,  as  in  size,  our  minds  are  not  superior  to  restraints 
and  shackles  ;  yet  all  history  goes  to  show  the  existence 
of  the  control  of  the  mind  by  heredity  and  circumstances, 
whether  these  inspire  assent  or  contradiction.  In  time, 
doubtless,  the  extent  of  these  influences  will  be  settled 
with  greater  definiteness  than  is  now  possible  when  even 
their  existence  is  widely  doubted. 


English  Literature.  441 

Genius  is  no  less  dremonic  than  it  ever  was.  Science  does 
not  destroy  the  inexplicable — it  merely  pushes  it  back  a 
little  ;  it  widens  the  horizon,  but  it  cannot  widen  it  in- 
finitely. We  discover  some  of  the  things  that  control 
genius,  but  not  its  whole  secret.  We  see  that  great  writers 
are  distinguished  from  madmen  by  the  coherence  of  what 
they  say  with  what  has  been  said  before.  This  they  may 
contradict,  but  yet  their  words  are  inspired  by  it.  Briefly, 
literature  is  a  vast  conversation  ;  it  strays  over  a  large 
number  of  subjects,  discussing,  aftirming  or  denying,  point- 
ing out  an  unsuspected  application  or  an  unanswerable  ar- 
gument, always  affected  by  what  has  gone  before,  just  as 
in  talk  a  witticism,  a  profound  or  pathetic  remark  springs 
from  something  already  said  or  done.  This  fact,  that  there 
is  no  parthenogenesis  in  intellectual  life,  should  not  be 
looked  upon  as  degrading  the  man  who  utters  the  witty, 
profound,  or  pathetic  remark,  for  it  certainly  does  not. 

In  the  fine  arts  we  see  the  same  laws.  We  discover  the 
beginning  of  painting,  Ave  trace  its  early  growth  in  Italy, 
and  its  swift  rise.  We  see  the  influence  of  a  master  on 
his  pupil,  as  of  Perugino  on  Raphael.  We  notice  its  de- 
cay, as  in  the  artificial  painting  of  the  last  century,  the 
sentimental  painting  coinciding  with  the  sentimental  novel 
and  play,  and  pre-Raphaelitism  in  this  century  contempo- 
raneous with  the  neo- romantic  movement  and  realism 
nowadays  in  pictures  and  novels.  Yet  we  do  not  feel  that 
we  are  unjust  to  painters  when  we  point  out  their  depend- 
ence on  their  predecessors  and  contemporaries,  either  by 
way  of  agreement  or  divergence  ;  to  some,  however,  this 
way  of  looking  at  writers  savors  of  irreverence. 

One  main  reason  of  this  is  doubtless  the  feeling — de- 
rived, with  some  justification,  from  the  time  when  liter- 
ature was  the  artificial  creation  of  scholars  —  that  liter- 
ature is  something  apart  from  human  life.      The  diver- 

19* 


442  English  Literature. 

gence,  if  it  exists,  is  fatal  to  literature,  which  is  nothing 
but  the  utterance  of  the  human  race  on  the  subjects  that 
attract  its  attention.  Every  generation  comes  face  to  face 
with  the  old  problems  of  life,  with  grief,  joy,  death,  as 
well  as  with  the  new  ones  that  every  century  brings  ;  and 
it  says  its  say,  it  puts  on  record  what  impresses  it,  what 
fills  its  thoughts,  what  it  hopes,  and  what  it  fears,  and 
whether  it  prefers  to  stand  up  against  fate  or  to  yield 
without  a  struggle,  whether  to  do  its  duty  or  to  hide  its 
face  in  the  sand.  This  utterance  is  what  is  called  litera- 
ture, just  as  art  is  an  expression  of  the  same  emotions  by 
other  means. 

Looked  at  in  this  way,  the  study  of  literature  becomes 
something  more  than  a  means  of  gratifying  jesthetic  tastes  ; 
it  throws  light  on  history,  which  records  men's  actions  ; 
indeed,  it  becomes  a  part  of  history. 


INDEX. 


"Absalom  and  Acliitophel,"  51-55. 

Addison,  liis  friendship  with  Steele 
discussed,  130,  and  n. ;  his  amia- 
ble ciiaracter,  130  n.  ;  liis  "Ac- 
count of  the  Greatest  Enf;;lish 
Poets,"  131-133,  and  n. ;  his  "  Bat- 
tle of  Blenheim,"  137;  his  travels 
in  Italy,  140 ;  his  opinion  of  Gothic 
architecture,  141-143,  and  n. ;  his 
cool  regard  for  mountain  scenery, 
144,  145,  150  ;  his  public,  158  ;  his 
Spectator,  160-182;  his  influence 
on  English  novel,  174-178  ;  his 
"  Cato,"  202  ;  his  kindness  to 
Henry  Carey,  231  n. ;  his  position 
witli  regard  to  quarrel  between 
Pope  and  A.  Philips,  232-234  ;  his 
commendation  of  the  "  Essay  on 
Criticism,"  234,  235,  408. 

Alenian,  Mateo,  "  Life  of  Guzman  de 
Alfarache,"  301. 

Allegories  in  literature,  284  n. 

"  Amadis  de  Gaule,"  87,  285,  286. 

Anne,  Queen,  the  time  of ;  its  char- 
acteristics, 2. 

Ardi-Jacohin  Review,  on  German  lit- 
erature, 429;  Hannah  More's  opin- 
ion of,  429  n. 

Aristotle,  influence  of,  163-167  ;  on 
the  drama,  189-191. 

Armstrong,  John,  his  "Art  of  Health," 
382. 

"Ars  Poetica,"  Horace's,  239;  simi- 
lar manuals,  234-245. 

Athenian  Mercurij,  the,  153. 

Athenian  Society,  the,  154. 

Aubignac,  I'abbe  d'  (Iledelin),  on 
the  unities,  195  n. 


Ballads,  Addison's  admiration  of, 
168-170;  V.  Knox  on,  402,  403. 

Beaumont  and  Fletcher,  "  Maid's 
Tragedy,"  revised  by  Waller,  93- 
95  ;  song  from,  118. 

Bedford,  Arthur,  his  attack  on  the 
stage,  128  n. 

Berkeley,  George,  Bishop,  his  feeling 
about  mountain  scenery,  147  n. 

Besser,  Johanu  von,  his  poems,  425, 
426. 

Blair,  Robert,  his  "  Grave,"  378, 
379. 

Blank  Verse,  Miltonic,  in  the  Eigh- 
teenth Century,  139  ;  Dr.  Johnson 
on,  404. 

Boccaccio,  Giovanni,  his  imitation  of 
the  Latin  prose  style,  17. 

Bodmer,  Johann  Jacob,  171  ;  con- 
troversy with  Gottsched,  171-173 ; 
his  tenets,  172  ;  his  influence,  335. 

Boileau,  Nicolas,  his  "  Art  Poetique," 
239, 242,  243 ;  predecessors,  242  n. 

Books,  number  printed  at  time  of 
Restoration,  38. 

Booksellers,  condition  of  at  Restora- 
tion, 41. 

Boswell,  James,  his  "  Life  of  Dr. 
Johnson,"  414,  415. 

Boyse,  Samuel,  his  rakish  life,  216  ; 
his  moral  poems,  380,  381. 

Brandes,  George,  on  French  devotion 
to  unities,  198. 

Brosses,  President  de,  his  opinion  of 
Gothic  arciiitecture,  143,  144  ;  of 
natural  scenery,  147  n. 

Browning,  Robert,  his  treatment  of 
unity  of  time,  201  n. 


444 


Index. 


^  Burger,  G.  A.,  inspired  by  Percy's 
"  Reliques,"  423  ;  his  "  Lenore  " 
translated,  423  and  n. 

Biinyan,  John,  the  growtli  of  the 
fame  of,  35  n.,  57  n.,  284  n. 

Burnet,  Gilbert,  Bishop,  his  opinion 
of  Gothic  architecture,  140. 

Burns,  Robert,  his  predecessors,  431 ; 
his  poems,  430-434. 

Burton,  Robert,  examples  of  his  style, 
from  the  "  Anatomy  of  Melan- 
choly," 6. 

Butler,  Samuel,  his  Hudibras,  41-43. 

Canitz,  F.  R.  L.  von,  425,  426. 
Carey,  Henry,  nicknames    Ambrose 
Philips  Naiahy-Pamh^,  229,  and  n., 

230  n.  ;■  his  "' Sally  in  Our  Alley," 

231  n. ;    his    "  Chrononhotonthol- 
ogos,"  325-327. 

"Cato,"  Addison's,  202,  203;  Gott- 
sched's  imitation  of,  203. 

Cervantes  Saavedra,  Miguel  de,  his 
connection  with  the  picaresque 
stories,  303. 

Chapman,  George,  his  translation  of 
Homer,  68. 

Chatterton,Thos.,his  poems,420,421. 

Chaucer,  versions  of,  72,  73  ;  editions 
of,  371  n. 

"  Chew  Chase,"  Addison's  praise  of, 
168-170. 

Classics,  translations  of,  39,  66,  67  ; 
admiration  of,  67  n. ;  authority  of, 
125,  126. 

Cleveland,  John,  his  ridicule  of  Puri- 
tans, 50. 

Clongh,  A.  H.,  his  testimony  to  the 
prejudice   against   Milton   at  0.\- 
iord,  36  n. 
I     Coleridge,  S.  T.,  his  interest  in  Ger- 
man literature,  428. 

Collections  of  early  poems,  388  n. 

Collier,  Jeremy,  his  attack  on  the 
stage,123-]29;  his  critical  method 
contrasted  with  Addison's,  157. 

Comedies  of  the  Restoration,  99. 

Congrevc,  William,  117  n.,  120. 

Contemporaneousness  in  literature 
not  determined  by  dates,  251. 

"  Contes,"  the,  and"  "  Fablia-ux  "  of 
the  Middle  Ages,  283. 


Corneille,  Pierre,  on  the  unities,  190- 
192;  his  "Cid,"  192. 

Coryat,  Thomas,  his  admiration  of 
Gothic  cathedrals,  142  n. 

Couplet,  the  heroic,  history  of,  28- 
34  ;  the  awkwardness  of,  in  the 
hands  of  writers  before  Waller, 
28,  29  n. ;  Waller,  the  first  poet  to 
treat  it  as  a  unit,  26,  29  ;  replaced 
the  stanza,  30  ;  the  gradual  disuse 
of  enjambments  in,  29,  30  n.  ; 
analogous  changes  in  the  French 
heroic  verse,  30  n. ;  Denliam's  use 
of,  31. 

Cowley,  Abraham,  preserved  the  tra- 
ditions of  the  school  of  Donne,  24- 
26  ;  his  classical  conceits,  27. 

Cowper,  William,  his  translation  of 
Homer,  70 ;  his  testimony  to  the 
prejudice  against  Bunyaii,  35  n. ; 
liis  poems,  437,  438. 

Cumberland,  Richard,  his  detestation 
of  Greek  tragedies  and  Spenser, 
386_n. 

Davenant,  Sir  William,  his  use  of  the 
stanza    in    "  Gondibert,"    31,32; 
quotation    fiom    his    jireface    to      • 
"  Gondiljcrt,"  32 ;    his  fierce   lan- 
guage in  "  Albovine,"  36. 

Dedications  in  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury, 211-213  ;  Pope's  mention  of, 
212  ;  practice  concerning,  212. 

Defoe,  Daniel,  his  Weekly  Reviao, 
156.;  importance  of  his  secoiuiary 
novels,  310-316;  "Robinson  Cru- 
soe," 3 1 0-3 1 2, 3 1 5 ;  "Colonel  Jack," 
312-314. 

Deists,  the  English,  273. 

Deloney,  Thomas,  his  novels,  305  n. 

Denham,  Sir  John,  his  use  of  the 
couplet,  31. 

Dennis,  John,  quotation  from  his  de- 
fence of  the  stage,  127. 

Diction,  poetic,  65. 

Didactic  poetry,  381-384. 

Diderot,  Denis,  his  admiration  of 
"  George  Barnwell  "  and  Moore's 
"  Gamester ;"  his  own  theoiies  / 
concerning  playwriting,  333,  334, 
and  n. ;  his  fellow-workers  in  de- 
nouncing   classic    French    stage. 


Index. 


445 


334  n. ;  his  eulogy  of  Ricliardrioii, 
339. 

"  Dull  Quixote,"  28;j-2S8. 

Dunne,  Juliu,  liis  siitire;*,  49  ;  his  af- 
fectations one  of  the  effects  of  the 
Renaissance,  22-24. 

Di-ytlen,  John,  43  ;  his  satire,  51-59  ; 
"  Mac  Flecliuoe,"  58,  62,  63  ;  "  Es- 
say on  Satire,"  69  ;  "  The  Hind 
and  the  Panther,"  60,  61  ;  his 
fickleness,  61,  62  ;  translations,?!, 
72  ;  versions  of  Cliaueer,  72,  73  ; 
Odes,  74, 75;  extravagance  of  lan- 
guage, 76,  77  ;  plays,  91-108  ;  his 
dramatization  of  the  "  Paradise 
Lost,"  101,  102,  104;  songs,  122  ; 
his  treatment  of  his  enemies  com- 
pared with  Pope's,  262-264. 

"Dunciad,"  the,  259-264 ;  its  causes, 
260-268;  result  of  Pope's  wrath, 
264. 

Dunton,  John,  his  praise  of  the 
"  Pilgrim's  Progress,"  35  n.  ;  his 
Aiheidmi  Mercury,  153  ;  his  de- 
scription of  Cambridge,  Mass., 
156  n. 

Dyer,  John,  his  "  Fleece,"  382. 

Elizabethan  period,  the  inspiration 
of  the,  2  ;  holds  in  solution  merits 
and  faults  of  later  time,  247  n. ; 
renewed  interest  in,  401,  402. 

"English  Rogue,"  the,  306-310. 

Episodes  in  novels,  302,  351. 

"  Essay  on  Man,"  the,  273-275. 

Etherege,  Sir  George,  107,  and  n. ; 
song,  120. 

Eui)luiisni,  its  Spanish  origin,  19,  23  ; 
in  Swinburne's  w-ritings,  20  n. 

Evelyn,  John,  his  opinion  of  Gothic 
architecture,  142  n.  ;  his  descrip- 
tions of  mountain  scenery,  146-148. 

"  Fabliaux,"  the,  and  "Contes,"  283. 

Fielding,  Henry,  his  mention  of  starv- 
ing authors,  217,  218;  his  "Life 
and  Death  of  Tom  Thumb,  the 
Great,"  323-325  ;  his  manner  com- 
pared willi  Richardson,  346  ;  his 
"Joseph  Andrews,"  346-351  ;  liis 
novels  related  to  picaresque  novels, 
351. 


Filling  Posf,  the,  152. 

Fraunce,  A.,liis  translation  of  Tasso's 
"  Lamentations  of  Amynias,"  21. 

French  imilations  of  Spectator,  180. 

French  influence,  the  so-called,  in 
literature,  explained,  10,  78-80;  ^ 
not  a  complete  explanation  of  the 
tendency  towards  correctness  in 
the  literature  of  Queen  Anne's 
time,  10 ;  literature,  the  aristocratic 
nature  of,  13  ;  the  influence  of  the 
Latin  writers  on,  14,  16;  French, 
the,  their  preference  of  Vergil  or 
Tasso  to  Homer,  15,  and  n.,  16  ; 
their  revived  interest  in  their  early 
writers,  388  n. 

Furetiere,  Antoine,  his  "  Runuin  Bour-     / 
geois,"  305. 

Gascoigne,  George,  his  "  Steele  Glas," 
44-46. 

Gay,  John,  his  "Pastorals,"  233  n. 

(jenius,  how  obedient  to  law,  439- 
442. 

German  imitations  of  Spectator,  180 
n. ;  interest  in  English  literature,    y 
419  ;    literature,   its    influence    in 
England,  428-430  ;    various  opin- 
ions concerning,  428,  429,  and  n. 

Germany,  literary  movements  in,  cor- 
responding with  those  in  France  ^' 
and  England,  424-427  ;  revival  of 
literature  in,  427. 

"  Gil  Bias,"  302,  303,  306. 

Goethe,  Johann  W.  von,  interest   in 
"  Vicar   of    Wakefleld,"   399 ;    in  ■ 
"  Ossian,"  417  n.,  418  ;  his  "  VVer- 
ther,"  427. 

Golden  Age,  85,  86. 

Goldsmith,  Oliver,  his  criticism  of 
"  Tristram  Shandy,"  353  ;  his  writ- 
ings, 396-400;  iiis  "Traveller," 
396  ;  the  "  Deserted  Village,"  397  ; 
his  romanticism,  397  ;  his  aversion 
to  the  new  spirit,  398  ;  the  "  Vicar 
of  Wakefield,"  399,  400. 

Gothic  architecture  regarded  as  bar- 
barous in  the  time  of  Queen  Anne, 
140-144  ;  though  admired  a  cen- 
tury earlier,  142  n.  ;  revived  in- 
terest in,  363 ;  architecture  be- 
comes fashionable,  365,  and  n. 


446 


Index. 


Gottsched,  Johanii  Christoph,  his  po- 
y^  sition  ill    Germany,  171  ;    contro- 

versy witli  tlie  Swiss  school,  171- 
173  ;  his  imitation  of  Addison's 
"  Cato,"  203,  335  ;  his  poems,  426. 

Gray,  Thomas,  his  "  Elegy  in  a  Coun- 
try Churchyard,"  390 ;  his  interest 
in  mountain  scenery,  391-393; 
takes  up  Norse  themes,  395. 

Greek  writers,  the,  of  secondary  im- 
portance in  the  revival  of  letters, 
11,  12,  163. 

Greene,  Robert,  his  "  Dorastus  and 
Fawnia,"  306. 

Grimmelsliausen,  Hans  J.  C.  von, 
v/  his    "  Simphcissimus,"    304  ;    its 

resemblance  to  "  Colonel  Jack," 
314  n. 

Hall,  Joseph,  his  satires,  37  n.,  46- 
49. 

Hardy,  Alexandre,  his  plays,  187. 

Head,  Richard,  and  Francis  Kirkman, 
"The  English  Rogue,"  306-310. 

Herder,  J.  G.  von,  leader  of  German 
thought,  423. 

Heroic  plavs,  83-91. 

"  Hind  an<i  the  Panther,"  the,  60,  61. 

Hobbes,  Thomas,  an  example  of  his 
style  from  the  "  Leviathan,"  4 ;  his 
praise  of  Davenant's  "  Goudibert," 
33. 
<•  Hofmannswaldau,  Hofmann  von,  his 
poetrv,  424,  425. 

Hogarth,  William,  380. 

Homer,  Pope's  translation  of,  68-70, 
252,  257,  258  ;  Chapman's  trans- 
lation, 68-70. 

Horace,  importance  of,  in  Renais- 
sance, 239  ;  translations  of,  39,  67. 

Howell,  James,  his  "  Letters,"  their 
gi'aceful  style,  9  ;  his  knowledge 
of  languages,  9  ;  his  opinion  of 
mountains,  147  n. 

"  ILidibras,"  41-43,  50. 

Hugo,  Victor,  his  destruction  of  the 
unities,  199,200. 

Humanity,  new  interest  in,  434. 

Hymns  tinkered,  422  n. 

Jest-l)ooks,  the,  305  n. 

Johnson,  Samuel,  his  comments  on 


the  metaphysical  poets,  22 ;  on 
Donne,  22,  23  ;  his  praise  of  the 
"  Pilgrim's  Progress,"  35  n. ;  his 
"  Life  of  Addison"  quoted,  163  n., 
170  n.  ;  his  account  of  impover- 
ished men  of  letters,  216  ;  his  own 
sufferings,  217  ;  on  Pope's  poetry, 
280  n.  ;  on  Richardson,  339  ;  on 
Sterne's  sermons,  360 ;  on  imita- 
tions of  Spenser,  385  ;  his  opinion 
of  blank  verse,  404 ;  of  Ossian, 
405  ;  his  relation  to  time  of  Queen 
Aime,  406  ;  compared  with  Addi- 
son, 408  ;  his  i?«;H6/tr,  409-412; 
his  social  satire,  409  ;  his  dishke 
of  collectors,  and  men  of  science, 
411-413;  his  "Irene,"  413;  his 
"Lives  of  the  Poets,"  413;  his 
prejudices,  414;  his  "Life,"  414, 
415. 
Journalism,  the  beginning  of,  in  Eng- 
land, 152. 

Knox,  Yicesimus,  his  testimony  to 
the  popularity  of  "  Pilgrim's  Prog- 
ress," 35  n.  ;"  his  "  Essays,"  401- 
403  ;  his  opposition  to  the  new 
spirit,  401-403. 

La  Harpe,  on  unity  of  action,  190; 
on  the  "  Rape  of  the  Lock,"  248  n. 

Lamb,  Charles,  on  German  literature,    ,  v 
428. 

Laudmann,  Friedrich,  his  exposition 
of  euphuism,  19. 

Latin  writers,  the,  their  importance 
in  the  revival  of  letters,  11,  12, 
and  n.,  14. 

Lee,  Xathanael,  90 ;  quotations  from 
his  plays,  104,  109-111 ;  his  "So- 
phonisi)a,"  133  n. 

Lessing,  G.  E.,  his  campaign  against 
the   unities,  191,  193,  194;    as   a     . 
transformer  of  the  stage,  335,  337. 

Lewes,  (J.  H.,  on  the  influence  of 
Aristotle,  166. 

Lillo,  (icorge,  his  "George  Barn- 
well," 327-332  ;  its  importance  to 
literature,  327  ;  its  literary  inferi- 
ority, 330 ;  its  successors  in  Eng- 
land, 330 ;  its  influence  in  France, 
330  ;  in  Germany,  335,  336. 


Index. 


447 


Lloy(],  Robert,  on  Milton  and  Spenser, 
385. 

Love  in  heroic  pla3's,  96-98. 

Lvly,  Jolin,  his  admiration  of  Can- 
terbury Cathedral.  142  n.  ;  his 
"Eupliues,"  19,  3UC. 

"  Mac  Fieclcnoc,"  58,  62,  63. 

"  Maid's  Tragedy,"  the,  revised  by 
Waller,  93-95." 

Mairet,  J.  de,  his  "  Sophonisba,"  188. 

Malherbe,  Fran9ois  de,  his  influence 
on  French  literature,  19,  21,  424. 

Marivaux,  Pierre  Carlet  de,  his 
"  Marianne,"  319-321. 

Marzials,Tlieodore,quoted,H»5,  and  n. 

Melancholy  in  literature,  in  Eliza- 
bethan age,  247  n. ;  early  in  eigh- 
teenth century,  247  n. 

Mendoza,  Hurtado  de,  Diego,  his 
"  Lazarillo  de  Tornies,"  quoted, 
291-298,  306. 

Metaphysical  poets,  the,  22. 

Milton,  John,  an  example  of  his  prose 
style,  7  ;  the  causes  of  his  unpopu- 
larity, 34-36  ;  the  representative 
of  Puritanism,  34 ;  the  dependence 
of  his  fame  on  politics,  35,  36,  and 
n.,  40  ;  early  imitations  of,  by 
Lord  Roscommon  and  Samuel  Say, 
237,  and  n.  ;  his  "  Samson  Ago- 
nistes,"  89. 

Mock-heroic,  63,  248-251. 

Montaigne,  Michel  de,  his  admira- 
tion of  Gothic  cathedrals,  142  n. ; 
his  feeling  about  mountains,  147  n. 

Montemayor,  Jorge  de,  his  "  Diana 
Enaniorada,"  86;  quoted,  133  n. 

Morality,  renewed  interest  in,  129. 
, ,  More,  Hannah,  on  German  literature, 
^        429  n. 

Morris,  William,  his  tran.slatlon  of 
the  "  ^Eneid,"  70. 

Mosheim,  J.  L.  von,  his  poetical  at- 
tempts, 426. 

Mountain  scenery,  the  slow  growth 
of  admiration  of,  144-148;  Gray's 
interest  in,  391  ;  Defoe's  views 
concerning,  393  n. ;  gradual  growth 
of  interest  in,  393,  394  n. 

Musffius,  exaggerated  reputation  of, 
at  time  of  Renaissance,  14,  and  n. 


Nash,  Thomas,  his    songs,  119;    his 

"  Jack  Wilton,"  306. 
News-letters,  55,  56. 
Nonconformists,  56. 
Norse  themes,  handled  by  Gray,  395  ; 

by  an  earlier  poet,  395  n. 
Novel,  English,  174-178  ;  history  of, 

282-322 ;  in  the  Middle  Ages,"282. 
Novelle^  the,  286,  287  ;   influence  (jf, 

on   the  English   dramatists,  287  ; 

translations  of,  into  English,  287  n. 

Odes,  74,  75. 

Opitz,  Martin,  424.  "^ 

"Orphan,"  the,  114-116. 

Ossian,  417-419. 

Otway,  Thomas,  95  ;  his  "  Venice 
Preserved,"  113,  114;  the  "Or- 
phan," 114-116;  his  ode,  116, 
117. 

"Pamela,"  316-319;  pronunciation 

of,  317  n. 
Pamphlets,  political,  driven  out  by 

journals,  152. 
Parliament,  debates  in,  how  reported 

in  time  of  Queen  Anne,  209. 
Pastorals,  84-86,  117;    Pope's,  224, 

225  ;    history    of,  225-234  ;    Am- 
brose  Philips's,    229  ;    Spenser's, 

226  ;  the  "Gentle  Shepherd,"  389. 
Pepys,  Samuel,  quoted,  42,  56,  72  n., 

92. 
Percy,  Thomas,  his  "  Reliques,"  421, 

422  ;    its    influence    in    Germany, 

423  ;  words  explained  in  his  Glos- 
sary, 322  n. 

Philips,  Ambrose,  his  "  Pastorals," 
229  ;  his  poems  to  the  Pulteney 
children,  229  n. ;  called  "  Namby- 
pambv,"  229,  and  n. ;  quarrel  with 
Pope,'232-234. 

Philips,  John,  his  "Cyder"  quoted, 
138,139,381;  his  imitation  of 
Milton,  138,  139. 

Picaresque  novels,  the,  287,  288 ; 
"Lazarillo  de  Tormes,"  291-298; 
characteristic  qualities  of  these 
novels,  299,  300;  "The  Rogue, 
or  the  Life  of  Guzman  de  Al- 
farache,"  301 ;  "  Life  of  Paul  the 
Sharper,"  3()2 ;  their  influence  in 


448 


Index. 


Germany  and  France,  304,  305  ; 
their  influence  on  Englij^h  litera- 
ture, 306-315  ;  on  Fieiding,  351. 

Picturesqueness  of  new  ideas  their 
first  claim  to  attention,  436. 

"  Pilgrim's  Progress,"  57  n.,  284  n. 

"  Pleiad,"  the,  classicism  of,  17-19. 

Poetry,  definition  of,  205,  206. 

Pope,  Alexander,  his  "  Pastorals," 
224,  225  ;  quarrel  with  Ambrose 
Philips,  232-234;  his  "Essay  on 
Criticism,"  234-245;  various  judg- 
ments of,243;  commentators'  notes 
on,  244  n.  ;  his  "  Rape  of  the 
Lock,"  248-251  ;  how  judged,  248, 
and  n. ;  his  translation  of  Homer, 
68,  252,  257,  258  ;  publishes  it  by 
subscription,  252  ;  his  "Dunciad," 
259-268;  his  edition  of  Shakspc'-e, 
265  ;  his  "  Essay  on  Man,"  273- 
275 ;  his  influence,  its  evaporation, 
280,  281;  his  emendation  of  Thom- 
son's blaniv  verse,  387. 

Prefaces,  58  n. ;   111  n. 

Prior,  Matthew,  281 ;  patronage  ex- 
tended to,  207. 

Prose,  modern  English,  about  the 
time  of  Queen  Anne,  4 ;  earlier  Eng- 
lish, specimens  of,  from  Ilobbes, 
Burton,  and  Milton,  4-7  ;  causes 
of  the  awkwardness  of,  before 
\Drydcn,  8  ;  comparison  of  Milton's 
jwith  the  present  German  prose 
style,  8  ;  the  old,  injured  by  ped- 
antry, 8,  9. 

Prynnc,  William,  his  "  Ilistrio-Mas- 
tix,"  80-82,  89  n. 

Puritanism,  the  influence  of,  on  Eng- 
lish literature,  34,  35. 

Quevedo  y  Villegas,  Francisco  Gomez 
de,  his  "  Life  of  Paul  the  Sharper," 
303. 

Ramsay,  Allan,  his  collections  of  old 
poems,  388  n. ;  his  "  Gentle  Shep- 
herd," 389. 

Readers,  number  of,  in  Milton's  age, 
38,  39. 

Renaissance,  the,  a  Latin  rather  than 
a  Greek  revival,  10-12,  and  n. ;  its 
pedantic  side,  240 ;  at  first  stimu- 


lating, then    narrowing,  240,  241, 
408. 

Restoration,  beginning  of  modern 
thought,  3  ;  material  progress,  3  ; 
the  time  one  of  criticism,  4  ;  then 
modern  prose  began  to  be  written, 
4  ;  comedies  of,  99  ;  civilization  in 
England  at  tin)e  of,  148-150. 

Revolution  of  1088,  its  effect  on  the 
position  of  men  of  letters,  186, 
137;  the  age  of,  242. 

RiccobonijLouis,  on  the  English  stage, 
195  n.,  332  n. ;  on  Gottsched,  203 
n. ;  on  French  stage,  334  n. 

Richardson,  Samuel,  on  mountain 
scenery,  147  n.  ;  his  "  Pamela," 
316-319,  338  ;  Voltaire's  oi)inion 
of,  338  ;  Diderot's,  339  ;  Dr.  John- 
son's, 339 ;  his  moral  teaching, 
339,  343  ;  his  "  Sir  Charles  Gramii- 
son,"  340-344  ;  influence  of  Rich- 
ardson m  Germany,  344  ;  on  Rous- 
seau, 348,  and  n. ;  Fielding's  reac- 
tion from,  346 ;  compared  with 
Fielding,  346. 

Ritson,  Joseph,  his  exactness  as  edi- 
tor, 421  n. 

Rochester,  Earl  of,  53,  118,  121. 

Rouian  Catholics,  position  of,  early 
in  eighteenth  century<|221,  222. 

Romances,  of  the  Midtile  Ages,  87, 
88,  282,  285  ;  their  disappearance 
before  the  non-lie,  the  picarcxqiie 
novels,  and  the  ridicule  of  Cer- 
vantes, 286,  287  ;  their  influence 
on  society,  288-291. 

Romantic    movement,    summary    of    , 
the  j)reparations  for  it,  416. 

Roscommon,  Lord,  his  "  Essay  on 
Translated  Verse,"  236,  237";  his 
early  inntation  of  Milton,  237, 
and  n. 

Rossetti,  D.  G.,  quoted,  74. 

Rousseau,  J.  J.,  on  fugues,  and  Gothic 
art,  144  ;  his  "  Nouvelle  Ileloise," 
345;  on  "Robinson  Crusoe,"  311. 

Royal  persons,  sole  heroes  of  pseudo- 
classic  tragedy,  112,  113. 

Rucellai,  Hernardo,  his  "Rosmunda," 
185  n. ;  his  "  Api,"  383. 

Rules  of  the  three  unities,  183-204. 

Russian  imitations  of  Spfrtator,  180 


Index: 


449 


n. ;    literature,    predominance    of 
passion  in,  178. 
Rymer,  Thomas,  134  ;    his  criticism 
of  Shakspere,  135  ;   on  tlie  prov- 
ince of  tragedy,  135  n. 

Sanazzaro,  his  "Arcadia,"  84;  "Ec- 
logas  Piscatorias,"  86. 

Satiies,  English,  44-59;  of  Pope, 
276-279;  his  English  predecessors, 
276,  277 ;  French  models,  277, 
278  ;  bis  imitators,  279  ;  modern 
view  of- satire,  279. 

Savage,  Richard,  his  method  of  life, 
214,  215,  217,  219. 

Scaliger,  Julius  Caesar,  his  opinion  of 
the  superiority  of  Vergil  to  Homer, 
14;  of  Musieus  to  Homer,  15. 

Sea rron, Paul, his  "Roman  Comique," 
305. 

Scotch  adherence  to  informal  poetry, 
387,  388,  and  n. 

Scott,  Sir  Walter,  his  inexactness  as 
editor,  421  n.  ;  his  translations 
*  from  the  German,  423. 

Sebilet,  Thomas,  his  "  Poetique  " 
quoted,  18. 

Sedley,  Sir  Charles,  song,  121. 

Segrais,  J.  R.  de,  quoted,  188  n. 

Seneca,  ii^uence  of,  on  the  modern 
drama  of  Europe,  12. 

Sentimentality,  its  early  appearance, 
336,  and  n. 

Shakspere,  William,  his  fame  at  the 
time  of  the  Restoration,  4,  92, 
93  ;  revisions  of  his  plays,  95,  99- 
lol,  416  n. ;  renewed  interest  in, 
4ul. 

Sheffield,  John,  Earl  of  Mulgrave,  his 
"  Essav  on  Satire,"  237-239. 

Sidney,  sir  Philip, his  "Sonnets,"  23; 
his  "Defense  of  Poesv,"  12  n., 
289  n. ;  his  "  Arcadia,""87,  88. 

"  Simplicissimus,"  the,  304,  314, 
and  n. 

Simpson,  Edwin,  on  the  dramatic 
unities,  186. 

Smollett, Tobias,  on  Gothic  architect- 
ure, 144  n.  ;  his  account  of  im- 
poverished authors,  217;  his  nov- 
els, 351. 

Songs,  in  plays  at  Restoration  and 


those  of  older  dramatists,  117- 
122. 

Sorel, Charles, his  "Histoire  Comique 
de  Francion,"  and  "  Le  Bcrger 
Extravagant,"  304  ;  on  the  French 
romans  comiques,  304  n. 

Spanish  influence  on  French  stage, 
187;  on  English  novels,  285-304. 

Speiiator,  the,  157,  160-162  ;  quoted, 
175-177  ;  influence  of,  on  man- 
ners, 178,  179;  success,  179,  180; 
imitations  of,  180-182;  papers  on 
MiUon,  162-171. 

Spenser,  Edmund,  edited  by  John 
Hughes  in  1715,  371  ;  imitated  by 
later  writers,  390,416. 

Sprat,  Thomas,  his  imitation  of  Cow- 
ley, 132. 

Stage, English, under  Commonwealth, 
82;  at  Restoration,  82-84. 

Stanza,  the,  tlie  analogue  of  the  old 
prose  sentence,  30  ;  its  decay  be- 
fore the  couplet,  30,  31. 

Steele,  Sir  Richard,  his  "Christian 
Hero"  and  other  early  writings, 
151;  the  Tathr,  156. 

Sterne,  Lawrence,  his  "  Tristram 
Shandy,"  352-359;  its  sudden 
success,  352-355  ;  various  judg- 
ments concerning,  353,  354  ;  Gold- 
smith's opinion  of,  353  ;  its  rela- 
tion to  the  new  sensibility,  355  ; 
its  mock  facetiousness,  356  ;  its 
literary  merit,  356  ;  his  sermons, 
359,  360  ;  Dr.  Johnson's  opinion 
of,  360  ;  his  "  Sentimental  Jour- 
ney," 361,  362. 

Stockdale,Pcrcival,67  n.,163  n.,414. 

Stories,  the  wanderings  of,  283  n. 

Subscription,  publication  by,  252. 

Surville,  Clotilde  de,  pretended  writ- 
ings of,  421  n. 

Swift,  Jonathan,  his  political  rela- 
tions, 210,  211,  213;  his  "Libel 
on  the  Rev.  Dr.  Delany  and  Lord 
Carteret,"  253-255. 

Sylvester,  Joshua,  his  translation  of 
"  "Du  Bartas,"  20,21. 

Symonds,Jolin  Addington, his  "Greek 
Poets"  quoted,  14;  his  "Renais- 
sance in  Italy,"  12,  17,  184,  185  n., 
280,  etc. 


450 


Index. 


Taste,  literary,  at  Restoration,  64. 

Tate,  Nahuiii,  58 ;  his  version  of 
"King  Lear,"  99-101. 

Tatler,  tlie,  156-160,  162. 

Tliomson,  James,  liis  early  strug- 
gles, 215,  216  ;  his  "  Sophonisba  " 
laughed  at,  323;  his  blank  verse, 
386  ;  helped  by  Fope,  387  ;  his 
poems,  434-436. 

Translations,  39,  66-72. 

Trissino,  (iiangiorgio,  his  "  Sofonis- 
ba,"  185,  186;  his  manual  of  the 
poetic  art,  240. 

Unities.lhe  three,  183-204;  in  French 
drama,  186-200  ;  in  Greek  plays, 
193  ;  their  expulsion  from  French 
stage,  199,  200,  and  n.  ;  Victor 
Hugo's  treatment  of,  200 ;  theii' 
fate  in  Italy,  200 ;  their  brief  reign 
in  England,  201. 

Vauquelin  de  la  Fresnaie,  his  "Art 
Poeticjue,"  243  n.,  389. 

"Venice  Preserved,"  113,  114. 

Voltaire,  F.  Arouet  de,  his  opinion 
of  Tasso  and  Homer,  15;  his  con- 
tempt for  Gothic  art,  144  ;  on 
Corneiile's  discussion  of  the  uni- 
ties, 190,  192,  196;  his  accoiuit  of 
"  Hamlet,"  197  ;  his  intolerance 
of  the  new  spirit,  171  n.  ;  on 
"Clarissa  Harlowe,"  338. 

Waller,  Edmund,  his  influence  on 
English  poetry, 26;  Dryden's  |)raise 
of  his  versification,  26  ;  quotations 
from  his  poems,  26-28  ;  his  classi- 
cal conceits,  27,  44 ;    his  version 


of  the  "  Maid's  Tragedy,"  93- 
95. 

Walpole,  Horace,  his  literary  judg- 
ments, 220,  364  ;  his  contempt  for 
authors,  220  ;  his  "  Castle  of 
Otranto,"  362-370 ;  his  compli- 
ments to  Voltaire,  364 ;  Straw- 
berry Hill  and  love  of  Gothic,  365  ; 
later  writers  follow  him,  369,  370. 

Walpole,  Sir  Robert,  his  scorn  of 
men  of  letters,  213;  their  efforts 
to  propitiate  him,  214  ;  Swift's  ac- 
count of  these  efforts,  253-255. 

Watts,  Isaac,  his  poems,  380,  381. 

Wixkhj  Jirriew,  the,  156. 

Whitinan,  Walt,  quoted,  103. 

"  Widow  of  Ephesus,"  the  wander- 
ings of  the  story  of,  283  n. 

Winchelsea,  Lady,  her  "  Nocturnal 
Reverie,"  245  n.  ;  praised  by 
W'ordsworth,  246. 

Winckelmaim,  J.  J.,  his  admiration 
for  mountains,  147  n. 

Wordsworth,  William,  praises  Lady 
Winclielsea's  "  Nocturnal  Reve- 
rie," 246;  his  "Evening  Walk," 
and  "  Hescriptive  Sketches,"  438, 
439. 

Writers,  government  patronage  of, 
in  time  of  Queen  Anne,  206-213; 
altered  condition  of,  in  ministry  of 
Sir  Robert  Walpole,  216-220. 

Young,  Edward,  his  contempt  for 
Bunyan,  35  n. ;  on  Dr.  Trapp,  201  ; 
his  "poems,  371-379;  "Satires," 
372  ;  "  Odes,"  373  ;  his  "  L;  st 
Dav,"  374;  "Night  Thoughts," 
375-377. 


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Accession  of  James  II.  By  Thomas  Babington  Macadlay. 
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HUME'S  ENGLAND.  The  History  of  England,  from  the  Inva- 
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David  Hume.  New  and  Elegant  Library  Edition,  from  new 
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GIBBON'S  ROME.  The  History  of  the  Decline  and  Fall  of  the 
Roman  Emjiire.  By  Edward  Gii'.bon.  With  Notes  by  Dean 
MiLMAN,  M.  GuizoT,  and  Dr.  William  Smith.  New  Edition, 
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GEDDES'S  JOHN  DE  WITT.  History  of  the  Administration 
of  John  De  Witt,  Grand  Pensionary  of  Holland.  By  Jamks 
Geddes.  Vol.  I.— I623-I654.  With  a  Portrait.  8vo,  Cloth, 
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HILDRETH  S  UNITED  STATKS.  History  of  the  United  States. 
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Organization  of  the  Government  nnrler  the  Federal  Constitu- 
tion. Second  Series:  From  the  Adoption  of  the  Federal 
Constirntiou  to  the  End  of  tlie  Sixteenth  Congress.  By  Rich- 
ard HiLDRETH.  rojmlar  Edition,  6  vols,  in  a  Box,  8vo,  Cloth, 
with  Paper  Labels,  Uncut  Edges  and  Gilt  Tops,  f  12  00.  Sold 
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MOTLEY'S  DUTCH  REPUBLIC.  The  Rise  of  the  Dutch 
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D.C.L.  With  a  Portrait  of  William  of  Orange.  Cheap  Edi- 
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MOTLEY'S  UNITED  NETHERLANDS.  History  of  the  Unit- 
ed Netherlands:  from  the  Death  of  William  tlie  Silent  to  the 
Twelve  Years'  Truce— 1584-1G09.  With  a  full  View  of  the 
English-Dutch  Struggle  against  Sjjaiu,  and  of  the  Origin  and 
Destruction  of  the  Spanish  Armada.  By  John  Lothrop  Mot- 
ley, LL.D.,  D.C.L.  Portraits.  Cheap  Edition,  4  vols,  in  a 
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MOTLEYS  JOHN  OF  BARNEVELD.  The  Life  and  Death 
of  John  of  Harneveld,  Advocate  of  Holland:  with  a  View  of 
the  Primary  Causes  and  Movements  of  "The  Thirty  Years' 
War."  By  John  Lothrop  Motley,  LL.D.,  D.C.L.  Illustrat- 
ed. Cheap  Edition,  2  vols,  in  a  Box,  8vo,  Cloth,  with  Pa])er 
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type Plates.  4  vols.,  8vo,  Cloth,  Pa])er  Labels,  Uncut  Edges 
and  Gilt  To])S,  $8  00.  Uniform  with  the  New  Library  Editions 
of  Macaulay,  liutne.  Gibbon,  Motley,  and  llildretli. 

HUDSON  S  HISTORY  OF  JOURNALISM.  Journalism  in  the 
United  States,  from  ICOO  to  1872.  By  Frederic  Hudson. 
8vo,  Cloth,  $5  00  ;  Half  Calf,  $7  25. 


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SYMONDS'S  SKETCHES  AND  STUDIES  IN  SOUTHERN 
EUROPE.  By  John  Addisgton  Symonds.  In  Two  Vol- 
umes.    Post  8vo,  Cloth,  i|i  00. 

SYMONDS'S  GREEK  POETS.  Studies  of  the  Greek  Poets. 
By  John  Addisgton  Symonds.     2  vols.,  Square  IGuio,  Cloth, 

$3  50. 

TREVELYAN'S  LIFE  OF  MACAULAY.  The  Life  and  Let- 
ters of  Lord  Macanlay.  By  his  Ne])hew,  G.  Otto  Tkevelyan, 
M.P.  With  Portrait  on  Steel.  Complete  in  2  vols.,  8vo, 
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Cloth,  $\    75. 

TREVELYAN'S  LIFE  OF  FOX.  The  Early  History  of  Charles 
James  Fox.  By  GiiORGE  Otto  Trkvelyan.  8vo,  Cloth,  Un- 
cut Edges  and  Gilt  Tops,  $2  50 ;  4to,  Pajjer,  20  cents. 

MULLER'S   POLITICAL   HISTORY   OF   RECENT  TIMES. 

Political  History  of  Recent  Times  (1816-1875).  With  Sjjecial 
Reference  to  Germany.  By  William  Muller.  Revised  and 
Enlarged  by  the  Author.  Translated,  with  an  A]ipendix  cov- 
ering the  Period  from  187G  to  1881,  by  the  Rev.  John  P.  Pe- 
ters, Ph.D.      12mo,  Cloth,  $3  00. 

LOSSINGS  CYCLOPEDIA  OF  UNITED  STATES  HIS- 
TORY. Popular  Cycloptedia  of  United  States  History.  From 
the  Aboriginal  Period  to  1876.  ByT?.  J.  LossixG,  LL.D.  Il- 
lustrated by  2  Steel  Portraits  and  over  1000  Engravings.  2 
vols.,  Royal  8vo,  Cloth, ,$12  00.      (Sold  by  Subscription  only.) 

LOSSINGS  FIELD-BOOK  OF  THE  REVOLUTION.  Picto- 
rial Field-Book  of  tlie  Revolution  ;  or,  Illustrations  by  Pen  and 
Pencil  of  the  History,  Biography,  Scenery,  Relics,  and  Traditions 
of  the  War  f(;r  Independence.  By  Benson  J.  Lossing.  2  vols., 
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LOSSING'S  FIELD-BOOK  OF  THE  WAR  OF  1812.  Pictorial 
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Pencil  of  the  Histo  y,  Biogra])hy,  Scenery,  Relics,  and  Tradi- 
tions of  the  last  War  for  American  Independence.  By  Benson 
J.  Lossing.  With  several  hundred  Engravings  on  Wood  by 
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thor. 1088  pages,  8vo,  Cloth,  $7  00;  Sheep,  $8  50;  Roan, 
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FAirrON"S  CAKICATURE.  Caricature  and  Otlier  Comic  Art, 
in  All  Times  and  ALiny  Lands.  By  James  Pakton.  203  Illus- 
trations. 8vo.  Cloth,  Uncut  Edges  and  Gilt  Tops,  $5  00;  Half 
Calf,  $7  25. 

MAHAFFY'S  GREEK  LITERATURE.  A  History  of  Classical 
Greek  Literature.  Bv  J.  F.  Mahaffy.  2  vols.,  12mo,  Cloth, 
$4  00;    Half  Calf,  $7  50. 

DU  CHAILLU'S  LAND  OF  THE  MIDNIGHT  SUN.  Sum- 
mer and  Winter  Jouineys  in  Sweden,  Norway,  and  Lapland, 
and  Northern  Finland.  By  Paul  B.  Du  Chaillu.  Illus- 
trated.    2  vols.,  8vo,  Cloth,  f  7  50. 

DU  CHAILLU'S  EQUATORIAL  AFRICA.  Exjilorations  and 
Adventures  in  Equatorial  Africa:  with  Accounts  of  the  Man- 
ners and  Customs  of  the  People,  and  of  the  Chase  of  the 
Gorilla,  Crocodile,  Leopard,  Elephant,  IIip]ioi)otanius,  and  other 
Animals.  By  P.  B.  Du  Chaillu.  Illustrated.  8vo,  Cloth, 
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DU  CHAILLU'S  ASHANGO  LAND.  A  Journey  to  Ashango 
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Du  CiiAii.i.u.  Illustrated.  8vo,  Cloth,  f  5  00  ;  Sheep,  #5  50  ; 
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DEXTERS  CONGREGATIONALISM.  The  Congregationalism 
of  tiic  Last  Three  Hundred  Years,  as  Seen  in  its  Literature: 
with  Special  Reference  to  certain  Recondite,  Neglected,  or  Dis- 
puted Passages.  With  a  Bibliograjihical  AiJjiendix.  By  H.  M. 
Dextkk.     Large  8vo,  Cloth,  f  G  00. 

STANLEY'S  THROUGH  THE  DARK  CONTINENT.  Through 
the  Dark  Continent;  or,  The  Sources  of  the  Nile,  Around  the 
Great  Lakes  of  Equatorial  Africa,  and  Down  the  Livingstone 
River  to  the  Atlantic  Ocean.  HI)  Illustrations  and  10  Majjs. 
By  H.  M.  Stanlky.  2  vols.,  Svo,  Cloth,  $10  00;  Siieep, 
$12  00;   Half  Morocco,  $15  00. 

BARTLETT'S  FROM  EGYPT  TO  PALESTINE.  From  Egypt 
to  Palestine  :  TIn-ough  Sinai,  the  Wihlerness,  and  the  South 
Country.  Observations  of  a  Journey  made  with  Special  Refer- 
ence to  the  History  of  the  Israelites.  By  S.  C.  Haktlktt,  D.D., 
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FORSTER'S  LIFE  OF  DEAN  SWIFT.  The  Early  Life  of  Jon- 
athan Swift  (1667-1711).  By  John  Forster.  With  Portrait. 
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GREEN'S  ENGLISH  PEOPLE.  History  of  the  Englisli  People. 
By  John  Richard  Green,  M.A.  Fonr  Volumes.  8vo,  Cloth, 
$2  50  per  volume. 

GREEN'S  MAKING  OF  ENGLAND.  The  Making  of  England. 
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SHORT'S    NORTH    AMERICANS    OF    ANTIQUITY.      The 

North  Americans  of  Antiquity.  Their  Origin,  Migrations,  and 
Type  of  Civilization  Considered.  By  John  T.  Short.  Illus- 
trated.    Svo,  Cloth,  $3  00. 

SQUIER'S  PERU.  Peru  :  Incidents  of  Travel  and  Exi)lora- 
tion  in  the  Land  of  the  Incas.  By  E.  Geouge  Sqiier,  M.A., 
F.S.A.,  late  U.  S.  Commissioner  to  Peru.  With  Illustrations. 
Svo,  Cloth,  $5  00. 

BENJAMIN'S  CONTEMPORARY  ART.  Contemporary  Art 
in  Europe.  By  S.  G.  W.  Benjamin.  Illustrated.  8vo,  Cloth, 
$3  50. 

BENJAMIN'S  ART  IN  AMERICA.  Art  in  America.  By 
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REBER'S  HISTORY  OF  ANCIENT  ART.  History  of  An- 
cient Alt.  By  Dr.  Franz  von  Reber.  Revised  by  the  Au- 
thor. .  Translated  and  Augmented  by  Joseph  Thacher  Clarke. 
With  310  Illustrations  and  a  Glossary  of  Technical  Terms. 
Svo,  Cloth,  .f  3  50. 

ADAMS'S  MANUAL  OF  HISTORICAL  LITERATURE.     A 

Manual  of  Historical  Literature.  CJompiising  Brief  Descri])- 
tions  of  the  Most  Important  Histories  in  English,  French,  and 
German.     By  Professor  C.  K.  Adams.      Svo,  Cloth,  $2  50. 

KINGLAKE'S  CRIMEAN  WAR.  The  Invasion  of  the  Crimea  : 
its  Origin,  nnd  an  Account  of  its  Progress  down  to  the  Death 
of  Lord  Raghin.  By  Alexander  William  Kinglake.  With 
Maps  and  Plans.  Four  Volumes  now  ready.  12mo,  Cloth, 
$2  00  per  vol. 

MAURY'S  PHYSICAL  GEOGRAPHY  OF  THE  SEA.  The 
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M.'f.  Maury,  LL.D.     Svo,  Cloth,  $4  00. 


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ENGLISH  MEN  OF  LETTERS.  Edited  by  John  Morley. 
The  following  volunies  are  now  ready.      Others  will  follow  : 

Johnson.  By  L.  Stephen. — Gibbon.  By  J.  C.  Morison. — 
Scott.  By  R.  H.  Hutton. — Shelley.  By  J.  A.  Symonds. — 
Goldsmith.  By  W.  Black. —  Hume.  By  Professor  Huxley. 
— Defoe.  By  W.  Minto. —  Burns.  By  Principal  Shairp. — 
Spenser.  By  R.  W.  Church. — Thackeray.  By  A.  Trol- 
lope. —  Burke.  By  J.  Morley.  — Milton.  By  M.  Pattison. — 
Southey.  By  E.  Dowden. — Chaucer.  By  A.W.Ward. — 
BuNYAN.  By  J.  A.  Fronde. — Cowpku.  By  G.  Smith. — Poi^e. 
By  L.Stephen.  —  Byron.  By  J.Nichols. — Locke.  By  T. 
Fowler. — Wordsworth.  By  F.  W.  H.  Myers.^HAWTiioRNE. 
By  Henry  James,  Jr. — Dryden.  By  G.  Saintsbury.  —  Landor. 
By  S.  Culvin.— De  Quincey.  By  D.  Masson. — Lamb.  By  A. 
Ainger.  —  Bi^ntley.  By  R.  C.  Jebb.  —  Dickens.  By  A.  W. 
Ward. — Gray.  By  E.  W.  Gosse. — Swift.  By  L.  Ste])hen. — 
Sterne.  By  H.  D.  Traill. — Macaulay.  By  J.  C.  Morison. 
12mo,  Cloth,  75  cents  per  volume. 

HALLAM'S  LITERATURE.  Introduction  to  the  Literature  of 
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ries.    By  Henry  Hallam.     2  vols.,  8vo,  Cloth,  $i  00;  Sheep, 

$5  00. 

HALLAM'S  MIDDLE  AGES.  View  of  the  State  of  Europe 
during  the  Middle  Ages.  By  H.  Hallam.  8vo,  Cloth,  $2  00  ; 
Sheep,  $2  50. 

HALLAM'S  CONSTITUTIONAL  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

The  Constitutional  History  of  England,  from  the  Accession  of 
Henry  VII.  to  tlie  Death  of  George  II.      By  Henry  Hallam. 

8vo,  Cloth,f2  00;  Sheep,  f  2  50. 

NEWCOMB'S  ASTRONOMY.  Popular  Astronomy.  By  Simon 
Newcomb,  LL.D.  With  One  Hundred  and  Twelve  Engrav- 
ings, and  five  Maps  of  the  Stars.  8vo,  Cloth,  f2  50:  School 
Edition,  12mo,  Cloth,  $1  30. 

PRIME'S  POTTERY  AND  PORCELAIN.  Pottery  and  Porce- 
lain of  All  Times  and  Nations.  With  Tables  of  Factory  and 
Artists'  Marks,  for  the  Use  of  Collectors.  By  William  C. 
Prime.  LL.D.  Illustrated.  8vo,  Cloth,  Uncut  Edges  and  Gilt 
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LIVINGSTONE'S  SOUTH  AFRICA.  Missionary  Travels  and 
llcsearches  in  South  Africa  :  including  a  Sketch  of  Sixteen 
Years'  Residence  in  the  Interior  of  Africa,  and  a  Journey  from 
the  Cape  of  Good  Hope  to  Loanda,  on  the  West  Coast ;  thence 
across  the  Continent,  down  the  River  Zambesi,  to  the  Eastern 
Ocean.  By  David  Livingstone,  LL.D.,  D.C.L.  With  Por- 
trait, Maps,  and  Illustrations.  8vo,  Cloth,  $i  50;  Sheep, 
$5  00;   Half  Calf,  $G  75, 

LIVINGSTONE'S    ZAMBESI.     Narrative  of  an  Expedition   to 

»the  Zambesi  and  its  Tributaries,  and  of  the  Discovery  of  the 

Lakes  Shirwaand  Nyassa,  1858-1864^.     By  David  and  Charles 

Livingstone.     Illustrated.      8vo,  Cloth,  $5  00;  Sheep,  $5  50; 

Half  Calf,  $7  25. 

LIVINGSTONE'S  LAST  JOURNALS.  The  Last  Journals  of 
David  Livingstone,  in  Central  Africa,  from  1865  to  his  Death. 
Continued  by  a  Narrative  of  his  Last  Moments  and  Sufferings, 
obtained  from  his  Faithfnl  Servants  CInuua  and  Susi.  By 
Horace  Waller,  F.R.G.S.  AVitii  Portrait,  Maps,  and  Illus- 
trations. 8vo,  Cloth,  $5  00;  Sheep,  $5  50 ;  Half  Calf,  $7  25. 
Cheap  Popular  Edition,  8vo,  Cloth,  with  Map  and  Illustrations, 
$2  50. 

BLAIKIE'S  LIFE  OF  DAVID  LIVINGSTONE.  Dr.  Living- 
stone: Memoir  of  his  Personal  Life,  from  his  Unpublished 
Journals  and  Correspondence.  By  W.  G.  Blaikie,  D.D., 
LL.D.      With  Portrait  and  Map.     8vo,  Cloth,  .f2  25. 

NORDIIOFF'S  COMMUNISTIC  SOCIETIES  OF  THE 
UNITED  STATES.  The  Communistic  Societies  of  the 
United  States,  from  Personal  Visit  and  Observation  ;  includ- 
ing Detailed  Accounts  of  the  Economists,  Zoarites,  Shakers, 
the  Amana,  Oneida,  Bethel,  Aurora,  Icarian,  and  other  exist- 
ing Societies.  With  Particulars  of  their  Religious  Creeds  and 
Practices,  their  Social  Theories  and  Life,  Numbers,  Industries, 
and  Present  Condition.  By  Charles  Nordhoff.  Illustra- 
tions.     8vo,  Cloth,  $i  00. 

NORDIIOFF'S  CALIFORNIA.  California:  for  Health,  Pleas- 
ure, and  Residence.  A  Book  for  Travellers  and  Settlers.  New 
Edition,  thoroughly  revised.  By  Charles  Nordhoff.  With 
Maps  and  Illustrations.      8vo,  Cloth,  $2  00. 

GROTE'S  HISTORY  OF  GREECE.  12  vols.,  12mo,  Cloth, 
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SHAKSPEARE,  The  Dramatic  Works  of  Sliakspeare.  With 
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$9  00.  2  vols.,  8vo,  Cloth,  $4  00;  Sheep,  $5  00,  In  one 
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BAKER'S  ISMAILIA.  Ismailia :  a  Narrative  of  the  Expe- 
dition to  Central  Africa  for  the  Suppression  of  the  Slave-trade, 
organized  by  Ismail,  Khedive  of  Egvpt.  Bv  Sir  Samuhl  Whitk 
Baker,  Pasha,  F.R.S.,  F.R.G.S.  "With  Maps,  Portraits,  and 
Illustrations.      8vo,  Cloth,  |5  00;  Half  Calf,  $7  25. 

GRIFFIS'S  JAPAN.  The  Mikado's  Empire:  Book  I.  History 
of  Japan,  from  GGO  B.C.  to  1872  A.D.  Book  II.  Personal  Ex- 
periences, Observations,  and  Studies  in  Japan,  1870-1874.  By 
W.  E.  Griffis.  Copiously  Illustrated.  8vo,  Cloth,  $4  00; 
Half  Calf,  $6  25. 

SMILES'S  HISTORY  OF  THE  HUGUENOTS.  The  Hugue- 
nots: their  Settlements,  Churches,  and  Industries  in  England 
and  Ireland.  By  Samuel  Smiles.  With  an  Appendix  relating 
to  the  Huguenots  in  America.      Crown  8vo,  Cloth,  $2  00. 

SMILES'S  HUGUENOTS  AFTER  THE  REVOCATION.    The 

Huguenots  in  France  after  the  Revocation  of  the  Edict  of 
Nantes;  with  a  Visit  to  the  Country  of  the  Vaudois.  By  Sam- 
uel Smiles.     Crown  8vo,  Cloth,  $2  00. 

SMILES'S  LIFE  OF  THE  STEPHENSONS.  The  Life  of 
George  Stephenson,  and  of  his  Son,  Robert  Stephenson ;  com- 
prising, also,  a  History  of  the  Invention  and  Introduction  of 
the  Railway  Locomotive.  By  Samuel  Smiles.  Illustrated. 
8vo,  Cloth,  f3  00. 

RAWLINSON'S    MANUAL    OF    ANCIENT    HISTORY.      A 

Manual  of  Ancient  History,  from  the  Earliest  Times  to  the 
Fall  of  the  Western  Empire.  Comprising  the  History  of  Chal- 
da3a,  Assyria,  Media,  Babylonia,  Lydia,  Phoenicia,  Syria,  Ju- 
'tlaja,  Egyi)t,  Caithage,  Persia,  Greece,  Macedonia,  Parthia,  and 
Rome.      By  George  Rawlinson,  M.A.      ]2mo.  Cloth,  $1  25. 

SCHWEINFURTH'S  HEART  OF  AFRICA.  The  Heart  of 
Africa.  Three  Years'  Travels  and  Adventures  in  the  Unex- 
plored Regions  of  the  Centre  of  Africa — from  18G8  to  1871.  By 
Dr.  Georg  ScinvEiNFURTH.  Translated  by  Ellen  E.  Fkewer. 
With  an  Introduction  by  W.  WiNWOOD  Reade.  Illustrated. 
2  vols.,  Bvo,  Cloth,  $8  00. 


Valuable   Works  for  Puhlic  and  Frivate  Libraries.  9 

SCHLIEMANN'S  ILIOS.  Ilios,  the  City  and  Country  of  the 
Trojiins.  A  Nafi-ative  of  the  Most  Eecent  Discovei-ies  and  Re- 
searches made  on  the  Plain  of  Tfoy.  By  Dr.  Hicnry  Schlie- 
jiANN.  Maps,  Fhms,  and  liliistraiions.  Imperial  8vo,  Illumi- 
nated Cloth,  $12  00;  Half  Morocco,  f  15  00. 

ALISONS  HISTORY  OF  EUROPE.  First  Si:rie,s  :  From 
the  Commencement  of  the  French  Revolution,  in  1789,  to  the 
Restoration  of  the  Bourbons  in  1815.  [In  addition  to  the 
Notes  on  Chapter  LXXVI.,  which  correct  the  errors  of  the 
original  work  concerning  the  United  States,  a  copious  Analyti- 
cal Index  has  been  appended  to  this  American  Edition.]  Sec- 
ond Series  :  From  the  Fall  of  Napoleon,  in  1815,  to  the  Acces- 
sion of  Louis  Napoleon,  in  1852.  8  vols.,  8vo,  Cloth,  $1G  00; 
Sheep,  .f  20  00;  Half  Calf,  .^3i  00. 

NORTON'S  STUDIES  OF  CHURCH-BUILDING.  Historical 
Studies  of  Church  -  Building  in  the  Middle  Ages.  Venice, 
Siena,  Florence.  By  Charles  Eliot  Norton.  8vo,  Cloth, 
$3  00. 

BOSWELL'S  JOHNSON.  The  Life  of  Samuel  Johnson,  LL.D., 
including  a  Journal  of  a  Tour  to  the  Hebrides.  By  James 
BosAVELL.      Edited  by  J.  W.  Croker,  LL.D.,  F.R.S.  '  With  a 

Portrait  of  Boswell.     "2  vols.,  8vo,  Cloth,  $i  00  ;   Sheep,  .f  5  00  ; 
Half  Calf,  $8  50. 

ADDISON'S  COMPLETE  WORKS.  The  Works  of  Joseph 
Addison,  embracing  the  whole  of  the  Sjiectator.     3  vols.,  8vo, 

Cloth,  .f  (J  00;   Sheep,  $7  50;  Half  Calf,  .$12  75. 

OUTLINES  OF  ANCIENT  HISTORY.  From  the  Earliest 
Times  to  the  Fall  of  the  Western  Roman  Em))ire,  a.d.  476. 
Embracing  the  Egyptians,  Chaldajaus,  Assyrians,  Babylouians, 
Hebrews,  Phcenicians,  Medes,  Persians,  Greeks,  and  Romans. 
Designed  for  Piivate  Reading  and  as  a  Manual  of  Instruction. 
By  P.  V.  N.  Myers,  A.M.,  President  of  Farmers'  College, 
Ohio.      12mo,  Cloth,  -f  1   75. 

JOHNSONS  COilPLETE  WORKS.  The  Works  of  Samuel 
Johnsiin,  LL.D.  With  an  Essay  on  his  Life  and  Genius,  by 
A.  Murphy.  2  vols.,  8vo,  Cloth,"  $4  00;  Sheep,  $5  00;  Half 
Calf,  $8  50. 


10  VuJuahJe   Works  for  Puhlic  and  Private  Libraries. 

THE  VOYAGE  OF  THE  "CHALLENGER."  The  Atlantic: 
an  Account  of  the  General  Results  of  the  Voyage  during  1873, 
and  the  Early  Part  of  187G.  By  Sir  Wyville  Thomson, 
K.C.B.,  F.R.S.     Illustrated.      2  vols.,  8vo,  Cloth,  $12  00. 

BLUNT'S  BEDOUIN  TRIBES  OF  THE  EUPHRATES. 
Bedouin  Tribes  of  the  Euphrates.  By  Lady  Anne  Blunt. 
Edited,  with  a  Preface  and  some  Account  of  tlie  Arabs  and 
their  Horses,  by  W.  S.  B.  Map  and  Sketches  by  the  Author. 
8vo,  Cloth,  f  2  50. 

BROUGHAM'S  AUTOBIOGRAPHY.  Life  and  Times  of 
Henry,  Lord  Brougham.  Written  by  Himself.  3  vols.,  12nio, 
Cloth,  .$(5  00. 

THOMPSON'S  PAPACY  AND  THE  CIVIL  POWER.  The 
Papacy  and  the  Civil  Power.  By  the  Hon.  R.  W.  Thompson. 
Crown  8vo,  Cloth,  $3  00. 

ENGLISH  CORRESPONDENCE.  Four  Centuries  of  English 
Letters.  Selections  from  the  Correspondence  of  One  Hundred 
and  Fifty  Writers  from  the  Period  of  the  Paston  Letters  to  the 
Present  Day.  Edited  by  W.  Bai'TISTe  Scoones.  ]2mo, 
Cloth,  #2  OO". 

THE  POETS  AND  POETRY  OF  SCOTLAND:  From  the 
Earliest  to  the  Present  Time.  Comjirising  Characteristic  Se- 
lections from  the  Works  of  the  more  Noteworthy  Scottish  Poets, 
with  Biograpiiical  and  Critical  Notices.  By  James  Grant 
Wilson.  Willi  Portraits  on  Steel.  2  vols.,  8vo,  Cloth, 
$\Q  00;  Shee]),  !|il2  00;  Half  Calf,  |U  oO  ;  Full  Morocco, 
$18  00. 

THE  STUDENT'S  SERIES.  Maps  and  Illustrations,  12mo, 
Cloth. 

FUANCE. GlHKON. — GrEECE. — RoME     (l)y     LiDDELL). — OlD 

Testament  History. — New  Testament  History. — Strick- 
land's Queens  ok  England  (Abridged). — Ancient  His- 
tory of  the  East. — IIallam's  Middle  Ages. — Hallam  s 
Constitutional  History  of  England.  —  Lyell's  Ele- 
ments of  Geology.  —  Merivales  General  History  of 
Rome. — Cox's  General  History  of  Greece. — Classical 
Dictionary.      $1  25  per  volume. 

Levviss  Hlstory  of   Germany. — Ecclesiastical  His- 
tory.— Hume's  England.     $1   '>()  jier  volume. 


Valuahle  Worls  for  Pithlie  and  Privaie  Libraries.  11 

BOURNE'S  LOCKE.  The  Life  of  John  Locke.  By  H.  R. 
Fox  Bourne.     2  vols.,  8vo,  Cloth,  Uncut  Edges  and  Gilt  Tops, 

$5  00. 

SKEAT'S  ETYMOLOGICAL  DICTIONARY.  A  Concise 
Etymological  Dictionary  of  the  English  Language.  By  the 
Rev.  Walter  W.  Skeats,  M.A.  12mo,  Cloth,  $1  25.  Uni- 
form  with  "  The  Students  Series.^' 

DARWIN'S  VOYAGE  OF  A  NATURALIST.  Voyage  of  a 
Naturalist.  Journal  of  Researches  into  tiie  Natural  History 
and  Geology  of  the  Countries  Visited  during  the  Voyage  of 
H.M.S.  Beagle  round  tlie  World.  By  Ciiaijlks  Darwin.  3 
vols.,  12mo,  Cloth,  $2  00. 

CAMERON'S  ACROSS  AFRICA.  Across  Africa.  By  Ver- 
NEY  LovETT  Cameron.      Map  and  Illustrations.      8vo,  Cloth, 

f  5  00. 

EARTH'S  NORTH  AND  CENTRAL  AFRICA.  Travels  and 
Discoveries  in  Nortli  and  Central  Africa:  being  a  Journal  of 
an  Expedition  undertaken  under  the  Auspices  of  H.B.M.'s 
Government,  in  the  Years  1849-1855.  By  Henry  Bartii, 
Ph.D.,D.C.L.  Illustrated.  3  vols.,  8vo,  Cloth,  $12  00  ;  Slieep, 
$13  50;   Half  Calf,  $18  75. 

THOMSON'S  SOUTHERN  PALESTINE  AND  JERUSA- 
LEM. Southern  Palestine  and  Jerusalem.  Biblical  Illustra- 
tions drawn  from  the  ^Manners  and  Customs,  the  Scenes  and 
Scenery,  of  the  Holy  Land.     By  W.  M.  Thomson,  D.D.     140 

Illustrations  and  Maps.  Square  8vo,  Cloth,  .fG  00 ;  Slieep, 
$7  00;  Half  Morocco,  $8  50;  Fidl  Morocco,  Gilt  Edges,  $10  00. 

THOMSON'S    CENTRAL    PALESTINE    AND    PHCENICIA. 

Central  Palestine  and  Plicenicia.  Biblical  Illustrations  drawn 
from  the  Manners  and  Customs,  the  Scenes  and  Scenery,  of  the 
Holv  Land.  By  W.  M.  Thomson,  D.D.  130  Illustrations  and 
Maps.     8vo,  Cloth,  i|6  00  ;   Sheep,  $7  00  ;  Half  Morocco,  $8  50. 

CYCLOPAEDIA  OF  BRITISH  AND  AMERICAN  POETRY. 

Edited  by  Ei'es  Sargent.  Royal  8vo,  Uluniiiiated  Cloth,  Col- 
ored Edges,  $4  50. 

NICHOLS'S  ART  EDUCATION.  Art  Education  ap],lied  to 
Industry.  Bv  G.  W.  Nichols.  Illustrated.  8vo,  Cloth,  $4  00 ; 
Half  Calf,  $G  25. 


12  Valuable  Works  for  PuMic  and  Private  Lihraries. 

CAKLYLES  FRKDEliICK  THE  GREAT.  History  of Friediich 
II.,  Ciilled  Fretieiick  tlie  Great.  By  Thomas  Carlyle.  Por- 
traits, Maps,  Plans,  etc.  6  vols.,  12ino,  Cloth,  $7  50;  Sheep, 
$9  90;   Half  Calf,  f  18  00. 

CAKLYLES  FRENCH  REVOLUTION.  The  French  Revolu- 
tion :  a  History.  By  Thomas  Cari.yli;.  2  vols.,  12nio,  Cloth, 
$2  50;   Sheep,"  $3  30;    Half  Calf,  fG  00. 

CARLYLE'S  OLIVER  CROMWELL.  Oliver  Cromwell's  Let- 
ters and  Sjieeches,  including  the  Supplement  to  the  First  Edi- 
tion. With  Elucidations.  Bv  T^o^^AS  Carltlk.  2  vols., 
J2ino,  Cloth,  |2  50;  Sheep,  $3*30;  Half  Calf,  $6  00. 

BULWER'S  HORACE.  The  Odes  and  Epodes  of  Horace.  A 
Metrical  Translation  into  English.  With  Introduction  and 
Commentaries.  By  Lord  Lytton.  With  Latin  Text  from  the 
Editions  of  Orelli,  Macleane,  and  Yonge.      12ino,  Cloth,  f  1  75. 

BULWERS  KING  ARTHUR.  King  Arthur.  A  Poem.  By 
Lord  Lyttox.      12nio,  Clutii,  $1  75. 

BULWERS  MISCELLANEOUS  PROSE  WORKS.  The  Mis- 
cellaneous  Prose  Works  of  Lord  Lytton.  2  vols.,  12mo,  Cloth, 
$3  50.     Also,  in  uniform  style,  Caxtoniana.     12mo,  Cloth,  $1  75. 

EATON'S  CIVIL  SERVICE.  Civil  Service  in  Great  Britain. 
A  History  of  Ahuses  and  Refoims,  and  their  Bearing  ujiou 
American  Politics.    By  Dor.man  B.  Eaton.     8vo,  Cloth,  ^2  50. 

DAVIS'S  CARTHAGE.  Carthage  and  her  Remains  :  heing  an 
Account  of  the  Excavations  and  Researches  on  the  Site  of  the 
Phcenician  Metropolis  in  Africa  and  other  Adjacent  Places. 
By  Dr.  N.  Davis.  Illustrated.  8vo,  Cloth,  f-l  00  ;  Half  Calf, 
$(;  25. 

TROLLOPE'S  CICERO.  Life  of  Cicero.  By  Anthony  Trol- 
i.opi;.      2  vols.,  I2nio,  Cloth,  $3  00. 

PEIillY'S  HISTORY  OF  THE  CHURCH  OF  ENGLAND.     A 

History  of  tiie  English  Ciim-ch,  from  the  Accession  of  Henry 
VJII.  to  the  Silencing  of  Convocation.  By  G.  G.  Picrry.  M.A. 
With  a  Skctcli  of  the  History  of  the  Protestant  E]iiscoi)al 
Church  in  the  United  States,  by  J.  A.  Si'KNCEr,  S.T.D.  Crown 
8vo,  Cloth,  $2  50. 


Valuable  Works  for  Public  and  Private  Libraries.         13 

ABBOTTS  HISTORY  OF  THE    FRENCH   REVOLUTION. 

The  French  Revolution  of  1781),  iis  Viewed  in  the  Liglit  of 
Republican  Institutions.  By  John  S.  C.  Abbott.  Illustriited. 
8vo,  Cloth,  $5  00;   Sheep,  $5  50  ;  Half  Calf,  $7  25. 

ABBOTT'S  NAPOLEON.  The  History  of  Napoleon  Bonaparte. 
Bv  John  S.  C.  Abbott.  i\Iaps,  Illustrations,  and  Portraits.  2 
vols.,  8vo,  Cloth,  $10  00;  Sheep,  $11   00;  Half  Calf,  $14  50. 

ABBOTT'S  NAPOLEON  AT  ST.  HELENA.  Napoleon  at  St. 
Helena;  or,  Anecdotes  and  Conversations  of  the  Emperor  dur- 
ing the  Years  of  his  Captivity.  Collected  fioiri  the  Memorials 
of  Las  Casas,  O'Meara,  Montliolon,  Antommarchi,  and  others. 
Bv  J.  S.  C.  Abbott.  Illustrated.  8vo,  Cloth,  |5  00;  Sheep, 
$5  50  ;   Half  Calf,  $7  25. 

ABBOTT'S  FREDERICK  THE  GREAT.  The  History  of  Fred- 
erick the  Second,  called  Frederick  tiie  Great.  By  Johx  S.  C. 
Abbott.     Illustrated.      8vo,  Cloth,  $5  00  ;  Half  Calf,  $7  25. 

DRAPER'S  CIVIL  WAR.  Historv  of  the  American  Civil  War. 
Bv  John  W.  Dhapek,  M.D.,  LL'd.  3  vols.,  8vo,  Cloth,  Bev- 
elled Edges,  $10  50;  Sheep,  $12  00;   Half  Calf,  $17  25. 

DRAPER'S  INTELLECTUAL  DEVELOPMENT  OF  EU- 
ROPE. A  History  of  tiie  Intellectual  Development  of  Europe. 
By  John  W.  Di!AI'eii,  M.D.,  LL.D.  New  Edition,  Revised.  2 
vols.,  12mo,  Cloth,  $3  00  ;  Half  Calf,  $G  50. 

DRAPER'S  AMERICAN  CIVIL  POLICY.  Thoughts  on  the 
Future  Civil  Policy  of  America.  By  John  W.  Drapeu,  M.D., 
LL.D.      Crown  8vo,  Cloth,  $2  00  ;   Half  Morocco,  $3  75. 

MCCARTHY'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  A  History  of  Our 
Own  Times,  from  the  Accession  of  Queen  Victoria  to  the  Gen- 
eral Election  of  1880.  By  Justin  McCahthy.  2  vols.,  12ftio, 
Cloth,  $2  50. 

ABBOTT'S  DICTIONARY  OF  RELIGIOUS  KNOWLEDGE. 

A  Dictionary  of  Religious  Knowledge,  for  Popular  and  Piofes- 
sional  Use;  comprising  full  Information  on  Biblical,  Theologi- 
cal, and  Ecclesiastical  Sid>jects.  With  nearly  1000  Ma]is  and 
Illustrations.  Edited  by  Lyjian  Abbott,  with  the  Co-o]iprati()n 
of  T.  J.  Conant,  D.D.  "Royal  8vo,  Cloth,  $6  00 ;  Sheep,  $7  00 ; 
Half  Morocco,  $8  50. 


14  Vahiahle   IVorls  for  Piihlic  and  Prirate  lAhrarieH. 

M'CLINTOCK  &  STRONG'S  CYCLOPEDIA.  Cyclopedia  of 
Biblical,  Tlieological,  and  P^cclcsiastical  Literature.  Prepared 
by  the  Rev.  John  M'Clintock,  D.D.,  and  James  Strong, 
S.T.D.  Complete  in  10  vols.  Royal  8vo.  Price  per  vol., 
Cloth,  $5  00;  Sheep,  $G  00  ;  Half  Morocco,  #8  00.  {Sold  by 
Subscription  only. ) 

MOHAMMED  AND  MOHAMMEDANISM:  Lectures  Deliv- 
ered at  the  Royal  Institution  of  Great  Britain  in  February  and 
March,  1874.  By  R.  Bosavoktii  Smith,  M.A.  With  an  Ap- 
pendix containing  Emanuel  Dentsch's  Article  on  "Islam." 
12mo,  Cloth,  $1  50. 

MOSIIEIMS  ECCLESIASTICAL  HISTORY,  Ancient  and 
Modern ;  in  which  the  Rise,  Progress,  and  Variation  of 
Church  Power  are  Considered  in  their  Connection  with  the 
State  of  Learning  and  Philosophy,  and  the  Political  History 
of  Europe  during  that  Period.  Translated,  with  Notes,  etc., 
by  A.  Maclainic,  D.D.  Continued  to  182G,  by  C.  Coote, 
LL.D.     2  vols.,  8vo,  Cloth,  #4  00;   Sheep,  $5  00. 

HARPER'S  NEW  CLASSICAL  LIBRARY.  Literal  Transla- 
tions. 

The  following  volumes  are  ready.  12mo,  Cloth,  $1  00  each  : 
Cjesar. — Virgil. — Sallust. — Horace. — Cici:ro's  Orations. 
— Cicero's  Offices,  etc. — Cicero  on  Oratory  and  Ora- 
tors.—  Tacitus  (2  vols.).  —  Terence.  —  Sophocles. — Ju- 
venal.— Xenophon.  —  Homer's  Iliad.  —  Homer's  Odyssey. 
— Herodotus. —  Demosthenes  (2  vols.). — Thucydides. — 
jEschylus. — Euripides  (2  vols.). — Livy  (2  vols.). — Plato 
[Select  Dialogues]. 

VINCENTS   LAND   OF   THE   WHITE    ELEPHANT.     The 

Land  of  the  White  Elepiiant :  Travels,  Adventures,  and  Dis- 
coveries in  Burma,  Siam,  Cambodia,  and  Cociiin-China.  By 
Frank  Vincent,  Jr.  Illustrated.  Third  Edition.  Crown 
8vo,  Cloth,  $3  50. 

RECLUS'S  EARTH.  The  Earth:  a  Descriptive  History  of  the 
Phenomena  of  tiie  Life  of  the  Globe.  By  Elis^e  Reclus. 
I'rofusely  Illustrated.     8vo,  Cloth,  $5  00. 

RECLUS'S  OCEAN.  Tiie  Ocean,  Atmosphere,  and  Life.  Be- 
ing the  Second  Series  of  a  Descri])tive  History  of  the  Life  of 
tiie  Globe.  By  £lisee  Reclus.  Profusely  Illustrated.  8vo, 
Cloth,  $G  00. 


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